Art Deco era sculptor Demetre Chiparus

Romanian Art Deco era sculptor Demetre Chiparus (16 September 1886 – 22 January 1947) created realistic bronze ivory sculptures inspired by Russian dancers – Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. The faces of ‘Persian Dance’ figures reveal the likenesses of Vaslav Nijinsky and Ida Rubinstein, and the dress in ‘Starfish Girl’ exactly reproduces the sketch for Goldfish’s dress from the ballet ‘Underwater kingdom’ by Lev Annensky. For his work Chiparus used the photos of Russian and French dancers, stars and models from fashion magazines of his time. His revived bronze is a manifestation of Art Deco style highlighting the timeless beauty of the dancers and fashion of the period.

Demetre Haralamb Chiparus was born in Romania, at the age of 23 he went to Italy, where he attended the classes of Italian sculptor Raffaello Romanelli for three years. In 1912 he went to Paris to study the Ecole des Beaux Arts. Already in 1914 he successfully exhibited his realistic style bronze and ivory sculptures called chryselephantine. Early motion pictures were among his more notable subjects and were typified by figures with a long, slender, stylized appearance. Coming from the oldest French tradition of high-quality and extra-artistic decorative arts, the sculptures of Dimitri Chiparus combine elegance and luxury, embodying the spirit of the Art Deco epoch. Demetre Haralamb Chiparus died in 1947, at age 61, and was buried in Bagneux Cemetery in Paris.

Demetre Chiparus created more than two hundred sculptures, most of which became hits at the art market in the lifetime of the master. Today Chiparus’s sculptures are subject of collectible rarities and reach record prices at auction.

source artdecogallery.ru