Strong, ambitious, convinced feminist, mother, sister and wife, hardworking and eager to show everyone that women’s place is alongside men, not behind them – this is how Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck (1879-1969) could be described in a few words ), an artist with a strong influence in the cultural life of the interwar period and the first female art teacher in Europe.
Art Safari is dedicating a large exhibition to him in the new season that opens on September 6. The exhibition is made in partnership with the Bucharest City Museum, and its curator is Drd. Ana Maria Măciucă-Pufu, museographer – Art Gallery of the Bucharest City Museum.
Maternity, Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck, collection of the “Frederic Storck and Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck” Art Museum, Bucharest City Museum
A sophisticated artist, with prestigious studies in Paris
Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck was born in Câineni commune, near Râmnicu Vâlcea. She was adopted by her maternal grandparents, Elena and Constantin, from whom she took the surname Cuțescu.
After graduating from the Central Girls’ School in Bucharest, on the recommendation of the Polish painter Tadeusz Ajdukiewicz – a personality at the time, who confirmed Cecilia’s talent -, she left in 1897 for Munich, where she studied at the Damenakademie with professors Fehr and Schmidt, and in 1899 she moves to Paris, where he studies at the Académie Julian with Jean-Paul Laurens and Benjamin Constant, and at the École de Beaux-Arts with Professor Humbert.
She marries the French violinist Romulus Kunzer (the father of the artist’s first child – Romeo) and stays in France until 1906. During her stay in the French capital, she keeps in constant contact with Romanian artists studying in Munich or Paris, but also participates in exhibitions organized in Romania. Also here, in the bohemian French city, he exhibits at Salon d’Automneat the Champ de Mars, and opened his first solo exhibition at the Galerie Hesséle, in the Rue Lafitte, in 1905.
In 1906, the artist returns to the country permanently and settles in Bucharest, and three years later she marries the sculptor Frederic (Fritz) Storck. Together they have two daughters: Gabriela Storck, who became an architect, and Cecilia (Lita) Botez, a ceramist.
Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck in Constantinople, 1938, Library of the Romanian Academy
Intense artistic activity, rewarded with numerous awards and distinctions
Since 1916, he frequently participates in the exhibitions organized in the country and abroad, but personal exhibitions are also opened for him: in 1906 and in 1924 at the Romanian Athenaeum, in 1928 at the “Ileana” Hall, in 1932 in his own workshop and the extensive retrospective at the Hall Dalles, since 1958. For her intense artistic activity she was rewarded with numerous awards and distinctions: the II Medal at Exhibition of living artistsin 1912; “Bene Merenti”, 2nd class, in 1914; Gold medal at International Exhibition from Barcelona, in 1929; Chevalier of the Legion of Honor – France, in 1929; Knight of the Order of Civil Merit – Spain, in 1930; Order of “Cultural Merit” in the rank of knight, in 1940; Order of Labor, 2nd class, in 1956; Emeritus Master of Art, in 1957 – some of them present in this exhibition.
Together with Olga Greceanu and Nina Arbore, she founded the Association of Women Painters and Sculptors. Later, the painter’s election as president of the Fine Arts Union in 1937 was beneficial for him. Under the patronage of Queen Maria, who was a great lover and supporter of the arts, Cecilia received a headquarters for the union in IC Brătianu Boulevard, as well as a space for congresses and exhibitions. He also obtained rights and privileges for artists: pensions, royalties, travel cards, tax breaks.
All these achievements are crowned by the most important one: the merit of being the first woman in Europe who managed to teach in a higher art academy, at the Department of Decorative Arts, starting in 1916. Her acceptance as a professor at the School of Belle -Art from Bucharest was celebrated with pomp in Paris, in the studio of the Polish painter Olga Boznańska, who also made a portrait of the artist, present in this exhibition. Among the guests were Max Jacob, Chana Orloff, Fernand Léger, Constantin Brâncuși, Oskar Kokoschka. Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck held this position until 1941.
The first people, Cecilia Cuțescu Storck, “Frederic Storck and Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck” Art Museum, Bucharest City Museum
Balcic, Cecilia Cuțescu Storck, National Art Museum of Romania
The concern for the mural left its mark on his own house, today a superb museum
After marrying Frederic Storck, the two built, in collaboration with the architect Alexandru Clavel, the building on Vasile Alecsandri street no. 16, which became the family home. The construction was completed in 1911, and between 1913 and 1917 the artist decorated the interior with numerous murals of symbolist inspiration, with female figures and lush vegetation as the subject, thus proving her concern for mural painting.
The harmonious combination of characters decorating the ceiling and walls of the central hall is reminiscent of oriental carpets, and the large composition in the background of the workshop, entitled Earthly love and spiritual lovethe artist was inspired by the book of the writer Ellen Kay, De l’Amour et du Mariage. As a tribute to this volume, Cecilia wrote the following quote under the composition of spiritual love: “To love is to lose ourselves in a soul in which our soul finds support, without losing its freedom; it is to find a thought that prevents our expressed and unexpressed feelings; is to encounter a gaze that sees reality in promises; is to feel a hand outstretched to our hands in moments of agony…”
In 1948, the Storcks’ artworks were declared of public utility, and in 1951 their studios were opened as an art museum, with the family retaining the living space. Currently, the building can be visited and houses the “Frederic Storck and Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck” Art Museum, part of the Bucharest City Museum.
The orange sellers, Cecilia Cuțescu Storck, “Frederic Storck and Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck” Art Museum, Bucharest City Museum
The artist’s studio in the house in Balcic, Cecilia Cuțescu Storck, the National Art Museum of Romania
Her murals, in the Aula Magna of the Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest and at Marmorosch Blank
The decoration of the house secured him several important commissions: the triptych Agriculture, Industry and Commerce for the Hall of Honor of the Marmorosch Blank Bank in 1916; The history of Romanian trade for the Aula Magna of the Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest, in 1933; Apology of Romanian arts for the ceiling of the Throne Hall in the Royal Palace – the current National Art Museum of Romania; composition Petru Cercel and his court – a decorative panel for the large hall of the Romanian Pavilion of International Exhibition from Paris.
The last mural was made with the help of two of his children, Romeo and Lita, for the ceiling of the loggia in Balcic, but it remained unknown and lost to posterity.
In 1943, the artist published an autobiographical book titled The fresco of a lifeand in 1966 the volume is completed and revised under the title A life dedicated to art. Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck died in 1969, in Bucharest.
“I will remain until the end a being who strives for heights…”
Opening the paths of monumental art, as well as the decorative vision in realistic painting, creating the most inspired and valuable secular murals of his time, masterfully contributing to the development of the pictorial virtues of drawing, creating the most artistic landscapes of Romanian graphics of his time, promoting always basing on solid drawing and at the same time sensitive and free, bringing to the treatment of man an evolved expressiveness, in which the intellect often plays the main role, and not capricious sensibility, introducing the great ideas and symbols into monumental and decorative art and familiarizing the public – as much as possible – with the specific requirements and rules of decorativism and stylization, Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck animated our culture and significantly enriched the artistic life.
For 60 years, he deepened and completed some of the most important ways of expression of Romanian plastic, uniting them with tradition and making them look towards the demands of the future. Nothing can better define the complex personality of Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck than her own words: “I will remain until the end a being who aspires to the heights, to building the sublime edifice of human effort in the middle of this wonderful universe.”
Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck, Rossio Square (Lisbon), “Frederic Storck and Cecilia Cuțescu-Storck” Art Museum, Bucharest Municipal Museum
Art Safari, the edition dedicated to women, can be visited from September 6 to December 15, from Thursday to Sunday, between 12:00 and 21:00. Tickets and the schedule of exhibitions can be accessed on the website.
