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Ladea, Romul
(b Jitin, Caras Severin, 17 May 1901; d Arcuda, Ilfov, 27 Aug 1970). Romanian sculptor and teacher. In 1920–22 he studied at the Arts and Crafts School (Scoala de Arte si Meserii) in Timisoara under Traian Novac and in 1922 at the School of Fine Art (Scoala de Arte Frumoase) in Bucharest with Dimitrie Paciurea. He first exhibited in 1923 in a group show in Cluj and later that year had his first major exhibition in Arad, showing two large portrait busts, A. D. Xenopol (Arad, Reg. Mus.) and Avram Iancu. He then went to Paris to study at the Académie Julian. He also attempted to work with Brancusi in his studio, but the two sculptors clashed and Ladea’s essentially figurative style remained unaffected by the encounter. Instead, he assimilated the formal ideas of Rodin, Aristide Maillol and Emile-Antoine Bourdelle, all the while maintaining his originality. His work from 1920 has symbolic undertones, as in Child’s Head (1963; artist’s estate). His forms are severely modelled and their surfaces cast strong areas of light and shade. In the 1930s and 1940s he sculpted a series of some of the great figures of Transylvanian history and culture (e.g. Simion Barnutiu, 1932; Cluj-Napoca, Mus. A.) stressing each one’s character. His subjects are often drawn from Romanian villages, as in Peasant from my Village (wood, 1935). Alternatively, he depicted popular myths and legends (e.g. Legend, 1940). Executed as wood reliefs, their contours dynamically and rhythmically undulate.
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