Equilibrium
With solid academic training from the Academy of Art in Saint Petersburg and the one in Vienna, the acclaimed artist nevertheless retains much of the charm of the old stone carvers, often stylizing contemporary processes in an archaic manner.
In the work Equilibrium, the affirmation of our shared need for intimacy and a protective space is conveyed through the tender placement of equally significant elements: a thick rectangular slab, tilted by a log beneath it, yet still supporting two corpulent animal figures—and, above them, a wheel containing anthropomorphic elements reminiscent of prehistoric figurines.
Through tenacious craftsmanship, supported by strong technical solutions and the fruit of extensive experience, Dumitru Verdianu skillfully transforms the solid mass of stone into a diaphanous suspension of dreamlike forms. Born in Ungheni, a short distance from IaÈ™i International Airport—but for many years separated from it by the barbed wire along the Prut River—the master’s work reaffirms the words of another great Romanian from the left bank of the Prut, Grigore Vieru: "We are not poor in wealth, But poor in tenderness…"
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Ioan RĂDUCEA​​
Dumitru Verdianu, the Basarabian from Ungheni, who lives in Vienna in the joy of stone carving, invites us—through his work titled Equilibrium—to descend into the auroral ages of humanity.
There is a subliminal message in these faces from the dawn of the world: a gaze lifted toward the Highest of the High. It is the search for the redeeming Light, which has defined all of humanity’s efforts across millennia—to break free from the earth and grow wings to fly. The archaic modeling, the preservation of the stone’s rawness, is a deliberate act by the sculptor to keep alive the ancient spirit—the one that still roams within the beings who conquer the skies today and throughout all ages.
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Grigore ILISEI
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