How 3 simple but striking outdoor sculptures changed a Christie’s expert’s life
- The Sculptural Ensemble of Constantin Brâncuși at Târgu Jiu in Romania taught Christie’s art expert Cristian Albu to question what it means to push boundaries
- ‘It’s a poem to humanity: a portal from the human to the realms of the gods,’ Albu says of The Endless Column, one of three works in the ensemble
A seminal work from one of the 20th century’s leading sculptors, the Sculptural Ensemble of Constantin Brâncuși at Târgu Jiu (1938), located across two parks in the southern Romanian city and consisting of The Endless Column, The Table of Silence and The Gate of the Kiss, celebrates the soldiers who defended the city during World War I.
Cristian Albu, co-head of the 20th and 21st century art department at Christie’s Asia Pacific, tells Richard Lord how it changed his life.
I was born in Romania. My mum is Romanian and my dad is Italian. When I was a child, during the (former Romanian dictator Nicolae) Ceaușescu era, I was sent to summer camps in June, July and August, from age seven to 17. I had no affiliation with or sensibility towards art then.
In 1985, when I was 10, I went to Târgu Jiu, which is close to where Constantin Brâncuși was born. I stumbled across these three monuments, and it was kind of like lightning striking me. It made me question and it made me wonder. It made me very curious about what art is.
Until then, for me, art was very classical – and then suddenly I came to Brâncuși, whose work is a kind of tremor between classicism and modernism. I started questioning what it means to push boundaries. It gave me the chance to dream, to hope and to open my horizons.
