77. Musicians' Evening [2001]

Starting from the idea that "we are actors of this world," Stefan Câltia opens a pictorial cycle dedicated to the show. The world of the spectacle in his work first appears in the form of the carnival. The artist adopts the moralizing sense of the proposed characters, illustrates the fascinating world of the circus, and presents an upside-down world. He outlines his repertoire from immediate reality and from his direct contact with divinity. He creates certain typologies that become leitmotifs of his creation, regardless of the chosen theme: the woman with wings, travelers, musicians or the bird - understood as a way of connecting with the heavenly environment. As the characters move from backstage to curtain, the artist demonstrates his mastery in illustrating magical realism, full of symbols, in a playful manner. The ambivalence of the semiotics proposed by the artist is revealed to us in simple motives, which have become leitmotif. The artist draws inspiration from the stories built by Pieter Bruegel and from the complex compositions of Hieronymus Bosch, and heads towards unusual choices, with characters of reduced dimensions, which he places in a large space. Câltia's protagonists tend to rise from the ground, hypnotized by the promise of a partisan perspective. In the canvases dedicated to flight or travel, Stefan Câltia presents himself in the guise of a visual narrator, while in the works presenting the world as a theater, the artist assumes a double role: as a stage designer and dramaturgist. The grammar of his plastic signs naturally converges towards complex states of mind. Rich in the expressive force of the central characters, the work at hand dazzles with chromatic contrast. The artist does not hesitate to use shades of red, which highlight the carnival in the musicians' costumes. The colors of the earth and the variations of red that succeed harmoniously in outlining a magical sunset create the ideal framework for integrating the shades of blue, yellow or green that clearly mark the presence of the characters.

References

GUȚĂ, Adrian; PAVEL, Amelia, "Ștefan Câlția", Possible Gallery, Bucharest, 2004.

Dimensions

width 132 cm, height 90 cm

Description

ulei pe pânză, signed and dated bottom left, in blue, "Câlția, 2001"

Dating

2001

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