Eustațiu Stoenescu

Place: Craiova

Born: 1884

Death: 1957

Biography:

Eustațiu Stoenescu was a Romanian painter born in Craiova in 1884 and died in New York City in 1957. He is known for his portraiture. His family originated from Oltenia in Romania. His father was a senator and his mother Mathilda was born in Brittany. He met the French painter Leopold Durangel in 1889 and moved to Paris in 1900. He was inspired by the work of Jean-Paul Laurens and had his first exhibition in 1905 at the Salon officiel de Paris and the same year in Craiova. He was immediately successful and had the opportunity to meet prestigious artists such as Auguste Rodin, Antoine Bourdelle, Henri Harpignies and Charles Cottet. By 1930 he was considered in French art circles to be the greatest living Romanian painter at the time. He was a great portraitist not only capable of showing physical resemblance of the model but also the psychological dimension. He went many times in Brittany where he painted landscapes especially in Loctudy. He was a friend of the sculptor Constantin Brâncuși, who made a portrait bust of Stoenescu's son Daniel Eustațiu Stoenescu (b. 1921-d.after 1970). Daniel went on to become a successful, Coty Award winning designer of inventive costume jewellery who, with Steven Brody, founded the Cadoro jewelry company in Manhattan. His rests are in the 'cimetière parisien d'Ivry', near Paris, in Ivry-sur-Seine.