“We have art so that we shall not die of reality.” ~ Nietzsche


  

Nellie Cristea, a mixed-media artist, was born in Romania in 1973. As she grew up, she experimented with acting, poetry, and embroidery. After completing her studies in social psychology and nursing, she left her home country in 2001 and began working in the healthcare  in Ireland. Over the past few years, she has experimented with a variety of media, such as etching, collage, painting, and sketching. She is currently enrolled at Dublin's National College of Art and Design in a Visual Arts Practice project.

 The artist was greatly influenced by the Dada movement and the freedom of no norms as an introduction to reflection. She starts each canvas with a layer of black paint, then applies plaster and acrylic to her paintings, mostly with her hands and knives. Her paintings have a vintage appearance and are intentionally abandoned. As part of her process, she regularly rinses the deep-edged canvases under water, as they are covered in innumerable layers of paint. She paints rusty, vivid and contrasting faded colors with powerful depictions of spectacle and motion.

Nellie's fascination with the theatrical, which seems to be the main theme of her work, and her past experiences are both revealed through her artwork.

//’’I was raised in a communist country. My early years during the old regimental political era were marked by an abundance of poetry and an idealistic reliability. It wasn't until I began experimenting with painting that my earliest memories began to lead me on a deep and transcendental artistic journey. Every piece of my art is a confession.  The core of the "CirCus" collection is the idea of an intriguing and fictional ancient circus. In every piece of the series, I'm just a child trying to perform as well as possible.’’//

//’’I would like my viewers to acknowledge  themselves in tandem. This dialog is the artistry in us all, it is what makes all art purposeful and evolutionary.’’//

Based in Dublin, Nellie debuted her artwork in her hometown of Beclean during the summer of 2017. Other public and private exhibitions followed, such as the 2019 Art Expo Rome and the NCAD graduates' exhibitions. The Bibliotheca Diaspora Europe Artists Site, the Irish art journal Void, and the Itaca journal Dublin have all featured her work and interviewed her. Her artwork is available for private or gallery purchases.

Nellie was influenced, among others, by Ruby Sterling, Oscar Murillo, and Eunice Parsons.