This is the first Romanian contemporary art museum, opened in 1967 as a place were specialists, visitors and artists could discover the new trends, subjects, techniques and changes in current art and artistic creation. Since the very first years of it's opening, the Visual Art Museum in Galati has been one of the most important and popular cultural institutions in the region, and it's impressive local collections are highly regarded by experts.
The permanent exhibition, presented in the museum's halls and in the large park around the building is a carefull selection of paintings, drawings and sculptures, drawn from the much larger collection in the storage space. It is actually a comprehensive presentation of four decades of contemporary Romanian art, as well as a presentation of national art in the 19th and 20th century. The names featured in this later part range from the great masters - Teodor Aman, Nicolae Grigorescu, Octav Bancila, Theodor Pallady, Gheorghe Petrascu, Stefan Dimitrescu, Nicolae Tonitza, Camil Ressu, Lucian Grigorescu - to the avantgarde of the 20th century - Victor Brauner, M.H. Maxy, Mattis-Teutsch, Marcel Iancu - to those postwar artists which actually make a passing turn from the beginning of the last century to it's last decades - Corneliu Baba, Alexandru Ciucurencu, Ion Tuculescu, Henri H. Catargi, Dumitru Ghiata, Rudolf Schweitzer- Cumpana and many others. The simple quality and diversity of the works selected for this permanent show are astounding, as some of the art works are of great value. And surely any collector would be more than happy to have at least one of these in his care.
The main and most interesting part of the Visual Art Museum collection is surely that dedicated to Romanian contemporary art, ranging from 1967 to 2005, many of the pieces featured being donations, as well as some acquisitions. It is fascinating for visitors, no matter how much or how little they know about contemporary Romanian art, to discover it's most important names, works and techniques. The names featured here range from Horia Bernea,Ion Nicodim, Ion Salisteanu or Ion Alin Gheorghiu to Octav Grigorescu, Georgeta Naparus, Marin Gherasim and many, many others.
Besides the painting and sculpture collection the Visual Art Museum also has a large and diverse collection of watercolors, drawings and graphics, signed by Marcel Chirnoaga, Dan Erceanu, Mircea Dumitrescu and so on. There is also an interesting selection of decorative arts, mostly featured in temporary exhibitions, by Ana Lupas, Serbana Dragoescu, Mimi Podeanu, Cela Neamtu, Serban Gabrea, Radu Tanasescu. Over the years several important donations have been made, such as the Idel Ianchelevici Donation, the Aramescu or the Roth-Ionescu one, making possible for the curators to present some of the works made by major artists who lived and worked in Galati.
Such an important cultural objective as the Visual Art Museum in Galati must be visited and discovered by all art lovers, as one of the most interesting places in the region. During the last years the museum also hosted several cultural events and happenings, all surprinsingly popular.
2008-03-31
