Sasha Moldovan

Sasha Moldovan (Russian-American, 1901-1982).

This work is offered unframed.

Accompanied by a hard-bound, first edition copy of the catalog of Moldovan's 1990 Carnegie Museum retrospective and a copy of 'Moldovan, 1901-1982; A Retrospective", the catalog for Moldovan's 1990 show at New York's Hammer Galleries.

Born to a Jewish family in Kishinev, Bessarabia, Moldovan first studied in Paris at the Académie Chaumière before immigrating to the United States. Over the course of a long and distinguished career, he exhibited widely and with success and was the recipient of numerous prizes, medals and juried awards.

Moldovan worked beside many prominent artists, including Henri Matisse and Chaim Soutine. The art critic Marla Berg wrote of Moldavan, "Had van Gogh painted Matisse's pictures while dreaming of Chagall, the result would have been the works of Sacha Moldovan..." In addition to these artists, Moldovan was influenced by the work of Chaim Soutine, and Pierre Bonnard among other members of the first generation of the School of Paris. We are pleased to offer a rare nude by the notable Post-Impressionist painter. This iconic figural work exemplifies both the artist’s characteristically saturated palette and his dynamic, almost vertiginous, sense of movement.

In 1931, the eminent art critic, Andre Salmon, summed up Moldovan’s career in these words: "Moldovan is an authentic painter. He could do nothing other than paint…” More than a hundred years after the artist’s birth, these words are confirmed as the judgment of history. This lyrical Post-Impressionist master has left us a stunning body of work, measured both in the breadth and depth of its artistic vision. Spanning sixty turbulent years of the twentieth century, Moldovan's 1990 retrospective at the Carnegie Art Museum highlighted his shimmering cascade of creativity.

“...Only a few artists, El Greco, in his View of Toledo, and Soutine, ever interpreted their visual sensations, their nightmares, and their anguish, with such vehemence, such an iconoclastic fury, and such spontaneous verve…as does Moldovan.” - Waldemar George

Signed 'Moldovan' center right

Moldovan, Ed. A. Voth, Publ. Museum International Books, 1990

Mural Painting in New York City, Berman, 1978, p.300

The Artists Bluebook, 2005 Edition, p.479

Davenport’s Art Reference Guide, 2003/4 Edition, p.1350; et al.