Art et société en Roumanie entre les deux guerres mondiales
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Abstract
The First World War marked a crucial point in the history of the
Romanian people, the climax of an age old striving: to achieve the national
unity. This world conflagration had deep influences on the entire political,
social, spiritual and artistic life in Romania. While still on, the war became a
source of inspiration for the artists; long after it was over they still drew on
it to create literary masterpieces. Whenever a Romanian writer is groping
to explain the development of social and moral structures, the tragedy on the
whole and that of the individual in our times, he will always refer to the First
World War. We are not concerned with the war as a literary subject matter—although it happened for the first time that such an event engendered essential works, not occasional ones—but with the new directions brought about into our
intellectual life and the new turn taken in all the domains of the culture.
Probing into the configuration of the Romanian art of the thirties and
forties, we would sense a direct response of the artist to the life’s impetus
—which in its turn underwent fundamental changes—and an indirect one
sublimated in literary and artistic works that are characteristic for the
Romanian spirituality. It could be said that for two decades (1920-1940),
the Romanian culture has known a truly golden age, sort of a renaissance
period. The man’s problems, his ups and downs, his tragedy were those of
the contemporary man, of the men from the trenches; the searching and the
anxieties were arising from the convulsions of the Romanian society, from
reproving certain anachronistic structures. Never before the mutations to
which our culture was submitted were so spectacular, deep, basic and never
was the decline of obsolete forms so swift and it never engendered such a capital new launch, to a renewal of structures which was complying with one
of the organic laws of the Romanian culture namely progress based on
continuity. Aspiring towards universality, one of the essential features of the Romanian culture in between the two wars, has not meant denying the folklore
inspiration which in the last century has prompted the revival of arts and
literature. The folklore was not an opposition against the renewals of the
modern art; it was an element of progress revealing the essence, outlining the
archetypes and the defining categories of the structure of the people’s soul.
By recalling that these directions were stood for by two outstanding
personalities of Romanian and universal art—George Enescu and Constantin
Brâncuşi—we would understand why the Romanian culture was deeply
national and at the same time had a perennial resonance in the world; using
traditions it renewed the structures of modern art.
Romanian people, the climax of an age old striving: to achieve the national
unity. This world conflagration had deep influences on the entire political,
social, spiritual and artistic life in Romania. While still on, the war became a
source of inspiration for the artists; long after it was over they still drew on
it to create literary masterpieces. Whenever a Romanian writer is groping
to explain the development of social and moral structures, the tragedy on the
whole and that of the individual in our times, he will always refer to the First
World War. We are not concerned with the war as a literary subject matter—although it happened for the first time that such an event engendered essential works, not occasional ones—but with the new directions brought about into our
intellectual life and the new turn taken in all the domains of the culture.
Probing into the configuration of the Romanian art of the thirties and
forties, we would sense a direct response of the artist to the life’s impetus
—which in its turn underwent fundamental changes—and an indirect one
sublimated in literary and artistic works that are characteristic for the
Romanian spirituality. It could be said that for two decades (1920-1940),
the Romanian culture has known a truly golden age, sort of a renaissance
period. The man’s problems, his ups and downs, his tragedy were those of
the contemporary man, of the men from the trenches; the searching and the
anxieties were arising from the convulsions of the Romanian society, from
reproving certain anachronistic structures. Never before the mutations to
which our culture was submitted were so spectacular, deep, basic and never
was the decline of obsolete forms so swift and it never engendered such a capital new launch, to a renewal of structures which was complying with one
of the organic laws of the Romanian culture namely progress based on
continuity. Aspiring towards universality, one of the essential features of the Romanian culture in between the two wars, has not meant denying the folklore
inspiration which in the last century has prompted the revival of arts and
literature. The folklore was not an opposition against the renewals of the
modern art; it was an element of progress revealing the essence, outlining the
archetypes and the defining categories of the structure of the people’s soul.
By recalling that these directions were stood for by two outstanding
personalities of Romanian and universal art—George Enescu and Constantin
Brâncuşi—we would understand why the Romanian culture was deeply
national and at the same time had a perennial resonance in the world; using
traditions it renewed the structures of modern art.
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