Paul Neagu

 

The first monograph on the influential Romanian artist and teacher

This is the first comprehensive monograph on the Romanian-born, UK-based artist Paul Neagu (1938–2004), whose oeuvre transcends traditional artistic disciplines, and who was for several decades an important source of inspiration for young artists, curators and intellectuals.

Neagu's philosophical approach led him to push the boundaries of the Western abstract tradition, which he first discovered clandestinely in Communist Romania.

He continued to explore abstraction after relocating to London in 1971, where he became an influential teacher at the Slade, Chelsea School of Art and the Royal College (among his students were Antony Gormley, Anish Kapoor and Rachel Whiteread).

Neagu's practice included performance, sculpture, drawing, painting, video, photography and poetry.

He often promoted physical engagement with his more tactile works, underlining one of his enduring aims: to refute what he perceived as the primacy of visuality in art.