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Concept
Constantin Brâncuși
Summary
Constantin Brâncuși (konstanˈtin brɨŋˈkuʃj; February 19, 1876 – March 16, 1957) was a Romanian sculptor, painter and photographer who made his career in France. Considered one of the most influential sculptors of the 20th century and a pioneer of modernism, Brâncuși is called the patriarch of modern sculpture. As a child, he displayed an aptitude for carving wooden farm tools. Formal studies took him first to Bucharest, then to Munich, then to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris from 1905 to 1907. His art emphasizes clean geometrical lines that balance forms inherent in his materials with the symbolic allusions of representational art. Brâncuși sought inspiration in non-European cultures as a source of primitive exoticism, as did Paul Gauguin, Pablo Picasso, André Derain, and others. However, other influences emerge from Romanian folk art traceable through Byzantine and Dionysian traditions.
Brâncuși grew up in the village of Hobița, Gorj, near Târgu Jiu, close to Romania's Carpathian Mountains, an area known for its rich tradition of folk crafts, particularly woodcarving. Geometric patterns of the region are seen in his later works such as the Endless Column created in 1918.
His parents Nicolae and Maria Brâncuși were poor peasants who earned a meagre living through back-breaking labor; from the age of seven, Constantin herded the family's flock of sheep. He showed talent for carving objects out of wood and often ran away from home to escape the bullying of his father and older brothers.
At the age of nine, Brâncuși left the village to work in the nearest large town. At the age of eleven, he went into the service of a grocer in Slatina; and then he became a domestic in a public house in Craiova, where he remained for several years. When he was 18, Brâncuși created a violin by hand with materials he found around his workplace. Impressed by Brâncuși's talent for carving, an industrialist enrolled him in the Craiova School of Arts and Crafts (școala de arte și meserii), where he pursued his love for woodworking, graduating with honors in 1898.
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