Background
Roman Cotosman was born in 1935 in Jimbolia, Timis, Romania.
Roman Cotosman was born in 1935 in Jimbolia, Timis, Romania.
Roman Cotosman came on the Romanian art scene in the 1960s and was one of the few artists at that time who challenged the all-dominant Socialist Realism concept and method imposed on the cultures of the Eastern European bloc, imprisoned not only geopolitically but culturally, too. He became a member of the Timișoara-based Group 111 in 1966 - 1969 together with Constantin Flondor and Ștefan Betalan. He took part in a landmark group exhibition showcasing the neo-constructivist tendencies in Romanian contemporary art, organized at the Kalinderu Hall in Bucharest in 1968.
After Roman's participation in the Constructivist Biennale in Nürnberg in 1969, Cotosman emigrated to the United States of America and settled in Philadelphia in 1972. Among his more recent exhibitions were Roman Cotoșman, Museum of Art, Timișoara in 2008 and 1997, Artists in Exile, MNAC Bucharest in 2006, Roman Cotoșman – George Apostu, Etaj 3⁄4 Gallery, Bucharest in 2006, East-West Gallery, New York in 1996.
As a member and co-founder of the 111 group, he developed his artistic activity in close connection with the constructivist and kinetic principles of the group. After the 1968 exhibition at Kalinderu, Cotoșman exhibited works at the Nürnberg Biennial, and emigrated to Germany, and later to the United States. His investigations in the sphere of abstract art tent towards a formalist, detailed analysis of the geometry so prevalent in the 111 group’s activity. Upon leaving the group, Cotoșman’s artistic interests also changed – he gravitated towards a more abstract-minimalist aesthetic. The artist died in 2006 in Philadelphia, United States.
Roman Cotosman adhered to the artistic traditions of Minimalism. Cotosman's desire to break free from the servitude of representation and bring his art, and Romanian art, into synchrony with the rest of Europe, led him towards Abstraction, of the constructivist kind. The temptation of artistic freedom, more than the desire to flee communism, the prospect of being able to achieve some of his utopian projects of large kinetic objects and ambient art, were instrumental in his decision to choose exile.
Quotations: "My drawings are my prayers. When I draw I do not feel the pain anymore... When I draw, I get lost in what I am searching... now I draw freely, my geometry is decomposing itself, just like me."
Roman Cotoșman was a member of Group 111 together with his friends Ştefan Bertalan and Constantin Flondor.
