The 10 Best Artworks By Paul Neagu

It’s been 11 years since the Romanian artist Paul Neagu passed away. A visionary creator that remained an outsider to the British art scene until his life ended, his work embodied philosophical concepts and original insights whilst playing innovatively with different medias: performance, painting, drawing and sculpture. We have combined ten of his works with ten artistic reflections in search of an understanding of the genius of Neagu.

‘Anthropocosmos 457 Cells (Skeleton)’ – 1972/1973

This work is part of the Antropocosmos series of drawings and plates. Paul Neagu was attracted by the energy that keeps parts, units and cells together as a result of the deconstruction of the human body; we come to realise that this is more than an aesthetic matter.

‘Nine Catalytic Stations’-1987

‘Empty Hand’- 1970

The relationship between materials was always a theme that Neagu was interested in, and is demonstrated directly here in this sculpture made of wood and metal. The grid is a representation of cells as a connection from the molecular level to the universal level.

Skulpture Crucificarea am Piața Victoriei in Timișoara

‘Jump’-1977-

The written ‘impulses and vectors’ on the right side of the artwork refers to the link between the concept of the body’s impulse movement and the vector as a system of structures, shown in the grid division that fills the male figure.

‘Tactile Object With Hinges’-1969

This white wooden box artwork represents another way in which the artist succeeded in explaining his relationship with materials, evoking tactile sensations from his audience.

‘Ceramic Skulls’-1973

This is a sculpture made from ceramic clay. The message expresses the transience of the human body as a memento mori. The grid as a cellular construction of the artwork functions brilliantly as a metaphor of the human body.

‘Great Tactile Table’-1970

This sculpture is made of wood, cardboard, textiles and glass, and represents how the individual human structure is composed of several parts. There is always a constant reference to the singular part versus the universal in Neagu’s work.

Triple Star Head at Furzton Lake, Milton Keynes

‘Palpable Object Object (Mosaic)’-1970

This sensory piece of art — which is currently exhibited at the Tate Modern — is made from wood, leather, metal, plastic and glass. It consists of a wooden box with colourful pieces of plastic forming an abstract shape with a dark interior.

‘Discovery’- 1997

‘Discovery’ consists of abstract artwork on paper made from different media. On the right-hand-side is a written Hyphen and Chora, the concept of which was often represented by the artist as a ‘fulcrum, a meeting point point between object and subject’.

‘Starhead’- 2003

Starhead is a sculpture at Furzton Lake which was installed in 2003. The artist himself stated that the piece ‘has a beauty of its own because it’s probably the first time [he] built a sculpture which is truly giving you a surprise as you go around inspecting it from 360 degree, 380 degrees, or how many there are in a circle’.
By Greta Adorni

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