In a wrinkled cream-colored suit, Devis Grebu, the well-known Romanian graphic painter and illustrator, has brought to his Chinese audience the expression of a very unwrinkled and childlike heart.
 
Lasting from July 19 to 31, his exhibition “Blossoming Roots” is one of the cultural exchanges jointly launched by the Ministry of Culture of the People’s Republic of China, Chinese Artists Association and the Embassy of Romania in China. It commemorates the 55th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Romania.
 
At the opening of the exhibition, Wu Changjiang, Chairman of the China Association of Print Paintings, said that one can find in Devis Grebu’s works the wit and humor of Romanian folklore, an Israeli emphasis on color, the elegance of Paris culture and the modernity of New York.

The works of Devis Grebu have been successfully exhibited in 30 countries, including France, Germany, Israel and the United States. His illustrations can frequently be found in publications such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Le Monde and Le Figaro Magazine, and he is listed in the “Who’s Who of the best illustrators in the World.”

An artist with deep roots but far outstretched branches, Devis Grebu grew up in an Eastern European culture where people have a passionate appetite for music and color. Then at the age of thirty-one, he left Romania and branched out into different cultures. For almost forty years he lived in France, Israel and the United States, before returning back to his old Romanian roots in 2001.
 
Graphic paintings, pastels, pen drawings, watercolors and wax crayon works; all have earned the seventy-one-year-old artist worldwide recognition, and all are marked by his greatest gift -- something he describe as “a strange alliance between tragedy and comedy.”
 
Devis Grebu’s works are referred to by art historians and critics as visual epigrams. Despite his personal disgust with the materialism, automation and dehumanization of modern civilization, he dresses them in coats of color and humor. As the reputed art-critic and professor Ms. Roxana Marcoci put it, “his works established Mr. Grebu as the heir of a long tradition of artist-scholars whose aim is above all humanistic in nature.”

The artist shows us his concern over the hoarse relationship between human and nature, the retrospection of human beings within themselves and the sorrow of life. Everything is delivered with stunning imagination, whether it be a flying Goddess of Liberty, or a butterfly woman transfixed to the showcase. “Grebu is holding a warped mirror to our modern world, one that distorts in order to see things more clearly,” Joan Babbage commented in “The Star Ledger”, a US newspaper.
 
Yet these heavy topics are not unbearably so in Grebu’s capable hands. His playful use of color and the soft, precise renderings of form enable understanding smiles and even hearty laughs on the part of the audience. “His fables of life in the latter part of the 20th century would be harrowing if it weren’t for the grace note of his humor,” sums up the appeal perfectly, once again courtesy of Babbage.

Innocence and sincerity can be found in many of Grebu’s works. He has illustrated over 40 American, Austrian and Romanian books for children and adults, and he has observed this tumultuous world through the eyes of a baby. He feels endowed with the power to express what he feels in the language of a child.
 
The experience of staying in many different countries both enriches the artist’s understanding of life and satisfies his curiosity. He incorporates all these blessings into the visual realm. “Each country gives you something,” said Grebu. “Even a bad experience always teaches you something good. I try to take the best I could from each place. Whatever you see is a result of this.”
 
When asked why the exhibition adopted the theme “Blossoming Roots”, the distinguished artist let out a childlike smile and explained that the main picture of the exhibition was also called “Blossoming Roots.”
 
“If you look carefully, you could see it is my self-portrait. My beard is the root and my nose is the tree, the trunk, the leaves and branches are my thinking, my dreams, my experiences, my soul.” “Blossoming is for this exhibition and I hope blossoming is also for my visit here.”
 
With this exhibition, Grebu said he wished to bring the message of friendship. “I’m thankful for this visit,” he said. “I received much more than I expected, much more.”
 
This message is well received by visitors studded in the exhibition hall. In front of the showcase, two young ladies said they loved Grebu’s works. “They are cute. I like his paintings.” Maybe these words are not as eloquent as those of the many art commentators, but they are strong evidence of the global admiration of this globally influenced painter.