Street front in an imaginary green city

I have just renewed on Etsy a large-size linocut I made a couple of years ago, entitled "Street front in an imaginary green city". This large-size linocut work is part of a series imagining street fronts through the combination of my favored independent lino plates depicting architectural elements. The separate houses, towers, and synagogue are inspired by actual places in east-central Europe, from the cities of Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu, and Dej (Transylvania, Romania) but also Torun (Poland). The unifying elements are color - in this case the green paper, and graphic interventions in silver for the contours.

I find it difficult to work directly on large formats, so my larger works are created through combinations (different linocut plates, like in this case, or collage, like in several others works you can see on my website www.anamariagruia.ro).
It is an appealing sofa-size artwork that will bring color and joy.
Dimensions: 26 x 68.5 cm (10.2 x 26.9 inches).

Street front in an imaginary green city, greenery 2017, emerald green, large-size linocut, architecture, original artwork by Goddess Gruia

Detail of linocut by Ana-Maria Gruia

Detail of linocut by Ana-Maria Gruia

Do not miss the sales coupon available on my shop, the Goddess Gruia on Etsy until the end of March 2017. 20% off on all prices using the code SPRING.
This season opportunity is about to expire - just 3 more days! 

Goddess Gruia is the patron of modesty, asymmetry, self-love and self-irony, peace, women museographers, hypochondriacs, slave reenactors, women artists, fat ballerinas, small business owners and many others! Buy these pieces of original art that are contact relics (have been touched by the goddess) and you will immediately feel the benefices!
Read the monograph here: https://issuu.com/anamariagruia/docs/gg_carte_tot_mic/3?e=3801591/39284262

Goddess Gruia painting Transylvania

Goddess Gruia, aka painter Ana-Maria Gruia on Etsy, is inspired by the cities of  Transylvania, especially by their details of medieval architecture. Using only natural colors and hearth-tones, she depicts such cityscapes using various techniques: linocut, collage (linocut, acrylic on canvas), mixed techniques (gold leaf, pencil). See more on her website - www.anamariagruia.ro, such as the 2010 exhibition "Medieval Cluj".

For the works available on her Etsy Shop, the Goddess Gruia, see them below, inspired by anonymous corners (such as the rooftops scene) and certain cities such as Cluj, Sibiu, Brasov and the Saxon fortified church in Calnic. These original artworks promote the heritage of the historical province of Transylvania and its aesthetic beauties.

Medieval scene from Transylvania, fortified church in Calnic, Virgin with child and St. Catherine of Alexandria, original collage, linocut

The small town of Calnic is built around a Saxon fortified church, dominated by a central keep. This latter elements and part of the curtain wall is depicted as background for an imaginary religious scenes with Mary and Christ child and St. Catherine of Alexandria.

Acrylic painting "Ode to Cluj", unique work of art, green and orange, ready to hang collage, Goddess Gruia, Transylvania, Romania

This original work is inspired by my home town, Cluj-Napoca, in the heart of Transylvania. The main square of the city is dominated by the Gothic church dedicated to St. Michael and I have chosen this landmark as focus of my miniature painting. 

Linocut work depicting the old apothecary shop in Cluj-Napoca, Transylvania, "The Hintz House" - original linocut print, historical monument

The Hintz House is one of the landmarks of the city of Cluj-Napoca, currently the History of Pharmacy Museum where I work and the site of the late medieval pharmacy. During the twentieth century it was owned by the Hintz family, hence the name of the monument- The Hintz House.

Tiny acrylic painting, The Guild House in Brasov, Transylvania, miniature art, small format contemporary painting, original from Romania

This small painting depicts one of the preserved medieval street corners of Brasov/Kronstadt, one of the leading Saxon cities in southern Transylvania, Romania. The building in question is the medieval Guild House of the city, a representative building of the trade that made the inhabitants rich. Brasov was an important mediator in the commerce between Transylvania, on the one hand and Walachia and the Ottoman Empire on the other.

Original acrylic painting, contemporary miniature, gold leaf, "Golden network" medieval architecture from Transylvania

The imagine scene is placed in the medieval town on Sibiu/Hermanstadt, in Transylvania, easily recognizable through the eye-shaped opening at roof level and the unmistakable shape of the medieval tower separating the large and small town squares.

 

Small acrylic painting, Roofs in Transylvania, miniature art, small format contemporary painting, original from Romania, unique original art

 

Imaginary street front from Cluj, Transylvania - linocut project

This large-size linocut work is part of a series imagining street fronts through the combination of my favored independent lino plates depicting architectural elements of my home town Cluj-Napoca (Transylvania, Romania): the Hintz House (The History of Pharmacy Collection, where I work as museographer), the Silversmith's House, the Dominican Church (in Museum Square), and the Tailors' Bastion, all in the center of the city. The separate plates are imprinted on black paper and the contours of the buildings are subsequently stressed in silver.
This is a unique, original work, signed and dated by the author, Ana-Maria Gruia. It is available online in my Goddess Gruia Etsy shop HERE. A 20% discount is also available until the end of March 2017, using the coupon code SPRING.

Due to the work's size, the best way to send it is in a cardboard tube, and you will be able to frame it according to your taste and budget :) As all graphic works, it is best framed in a simple, square section frame, but it can also be turned into a sofa-size painting by adding a generous passepartout and a flamboyant golden or silver frame.
Dimensions: 24 x 67.5 cm (9.4 x 26.5 inches)

 

Large linocut, Imaginary street front by night in Cluj-Napoca, original art from Transylvania, Romania, architectural scene, Goddess Gruia

Detail with the Silversmith's House from Cluj-Napoca, linocut by Ana-Maria Gruia

Detail with the Dominican Church in Cluj-Napoca, linocut by Ana-Maria Gruia

Detail of the Hintz House in Cluj-Napoca, linocut by Ana-Maria Gruia

Urban Transylvanian paintings

GoddessGruia specializes in depictions of herself and the medieval cities of Transylvania. Here is a selection of the latter, available on Etsy, created in various techniques: acrylic on cardboard, linocut, mixed media (collage, linocut, acrylic on canvas).

Don't forget to use the 50% discount coupon "STUDIOMOVE" available until the end of February 2017.

Miniature acrylic on cardboard - Brasov/Kronstadt - by Ana Maria Gruia

Lincout - Cluj-Napoca/Kolozsvar/Klausenburg - by Ana Maria Gruia

Mixed media - Cluj/Kolozsvar/Kalusenburg/Claudiopolis - by Ana Maria Gruia

Mixed media - Sibiu/Hermanstadt - by Ana-Maria Gruia

Goddess Gruia is the patron of modesty, asymmetry, self-love and self-irony, peace, women museographers, hypochondriacs, slave reenactors, women artists, fat ballerinas, small business owners and many others! Buy these pieces of original art that are contact relics (have been touched by the goddess) and you will immediately feel the benefices!
Read the monograph here: https://issuu.com/anamariagruia/docs/gg_carte_tot_mic/3?e=3801591/39284262

Main square of Cluj in 1870

Sárdi István is the author of one of the emblematic paintings rendering the main square of the city of Cluj during the nineteenth century. One of these works depicts several houses on the northern side of the square, typically Renaissance in their structure, portals and window openings, with outreaching wooden attics. The era's atmosphere is suggested by the depiction of a fast-moving chalet, the painted commercials on the facades and the women in nineteenth century costumes gathered by the public water well.

The postcard is available at the History of Pharmacy Collection and at the National History Museum on Transylvania in Cluj.

Postcard reproducing almost all of the painting, edited by the National history Museum of Transylvania

Black and white reproduction of the entire painting.

Murádin Jenő has attempted to reconstruct the painters life and career. He states that "Sárdi was born into a famous Unitarian family from Torockó (Rimetea). He first learned from György Vastagh (1834–1922), a painter who studied in Vienna, then he went to the Kunstschule of Nurenberg with a scholarship offered by Gusztáv Keleti (1834–1902), the founder of the Drawing School. Sárdi met the well-known Hungarian painter Mihály Munkácsy (1844–1900), who even offered him his own studio. When Sárdi returned home, he taught drawing in the State Training School of Kolozsvár, but his last decade was marked by the disease of tabes dorsalis (syphilitic myelopathy). Unfortunately many of his paintings have been lost or destroyed." 

See more on the painter in Hungarian HERE.

Apothecaries and cures in Early Modern Cluj

This is the title of my latest presentation delivered during the "Cluj/Kolozsvár/Klausenburg – 700" international conference held in Cluj-Napoca by the Sapientia and Babes Bolyai Universities. My presentation attempted to reconstruct the Early Modern history of apothecary shops and pharmacies of Cluj (i.e. between the 16th and the 18th century), identifying traits and developments in the field  (in comparison to the rest of Transylvania and Western Europe) and to verify is there are any novel strategies in marketing and retail employed by pharmacists to boost their sales. Until the article is finished for the collective volume of the conference, fell free to check my presentation on academia.edu HERE.

The full program of the conference is available in Romanian HERE.

One of the documents preserved at the History of Pharmacy Collection in Cluj is an eighteenth-century manuscript, a tariffs project by Tobias Maucksch or Mauksch, the privileged pharmacist of Cluj, owner of the apothecary shop hosting the museum today.

Experimenting with gold leaf

Adding gold leaf to paintings is much like including writing: it can be easily overdone, turning an extra decorative effect into the main impression and thus ruining the work. It naturally presents the advantage of its high associations, probably started from the gilded icons and religious works of art of the medieval period, adding symbolic value if nothing else (as the actual foil is rather inexpensive). 

I have tried out some new ways of applying gold foil. The first idea was to create a king of network to unify the composition, but it proved too much and a bit too Baroque (as all associations of white and gold in my mind :) The overall impression of the collage (lino prints, acrylic painting) is of too many elements in too small a space.

These first two works are inspired by the medievalish architecture of Transylvania, namely the Mathias Corvinus House in Cluj-Napoca (above) and the old city tower and typical eyed roofs of Sibiu (below).
 

The second attempt envisages the use of gold foil lines against a dark background. The abstract composition is not so much according to my style, but the desired effect is interesting: the small detail of gold leaf drawing, continuing the small row of linoprinted houses, the continuation of the arch in the center of the painting, even the signature might not be that bad. I've decided to name this third work "The Alchemist's Midnight Dance", though it is just made using elements from previous projects: alchemical symbols, the Happy Houses, and an older lino scene with the Virgin's Presentation to the Temple [read about this iconographic type HERE].

 

Garage Art Sale ediţia 6

Editia a 6-a sambata, 3 martie 2012!

Asociaţia apARTe vă invită în prima sâmbătă din fiecare lună să cotrobăiţi prin atelierul de pictură şi ceramică din str. Anatole France nr. 48, Cluj-Napoca.

Ana şi Viviana vă aşteaptă de la 11 la 18 cu lucrări mai vechi şi mai noi, unele chilipiruri, altele cam scumpe, cu tablouri, gravuri, sculpturi, figurine de ceramică, veioze, ghivece, magneţi, bijuterii, semne de carte, rame, oglinzi şi multe alte minunăţii.

Garage Arte Sale este o ocazie pentru vizitatori de a intra într-un atelier de artă, de a vedea procesul de creaţie şi tehnicile folosite şi de a cumpăra obiecte unicat direct de la artişti. Vă aşteptăm la atelier!

Bast Art

O noua editie a targului de arta, la Bastionul Croitorilor! Peste 20 de artisti expun si vand obiecte de arta decorativa.

New edition of the art fair organized by apARTe NGO, at the Tailors' Bastion in Cluj-Napoca. More than 20 artists present their decorative art creations.