Artist: Valchan Petrov
Date: 1980s
Dimensions: 4.33 х 1.93 m
This mosaic depicts two griffins placed symmetrically on both sides of a decorative shield. The tesserae are all made from artificial materials – gold plated glass tiles in different shades of old gold, bronze, and copper for the mosaic’s background and smalt in green, orange, red, ochre, and yellow colors in different shades for the figural scene. The binding solution is a light color, probably cement with a fine-grained filler, and can be seen in the mosaic’s joints and destroyed areas.
The mosaic was laid in situ by the artist and his apprentices.
Chitalishte “Aleko Konstantinov”, Plovdiv.
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Valchan Petrov
Valchan Petrov
photo: BTA PressPhoto
Valchan Petrov was born in 1947 in the town of Hissarya, Bulgaria. In 1975, he graduated from the “Wall painting” program in the National Academy of Art in Sofia in the class of prof. Georgi Bogdanov and Mito Ganovski. He has been a member of the Union of Bulgarian Artists (UBA) since 1979 and the director of the City Art Gallery in Plovdiv between 1984 and 1993. He worked in the mediums of painting, ceramics, wall painting, and mosaics. He has over fifty solo exhibitions in Bulgaria and abroad.
Among his most prominent monumental works are the following:
● the wall painting “History of the Bulgarian Communist party” in a cinema theater (Montana, Northwestern Bulgaria, 1975);
● the sgraffito wall painting “Renaissance” in the courtyard of the Union of Bulgarian Architects (Sofia, 1975);
● the mosaic “Hissar – ancient and young” made from smalt and stones and located in the foyer of the national chitalishte (community center) “Ivan Vazov ” (Hissarya, 1984);
● the wall painting “History of pharmaceutics” in pharmacy №22 (Plovdiv, 1985);
● a mosaic made from smalt and stones and located in the “Central laboratory for microprocessors”, in collaboration with Dimo Kenov and architect Neli Yaneva (Plovdiv, 1984).
Valchan Petrov received the following Bulgarian and international awards: the grand prize from the First International Painting competition, “Henry Tanas” gallery, Toronto, Canada (1990); the First prize for paintings, Forum Flandro-Bulgaricum, Sofia, Bulgaria (1996); the First Prize at The Fifth Art Exhibition, The National Palace of Culture, Sofia, Bulgaria (2000); and the Special Award Stara Zagora -The First Balkan Quadrinalle titled “Myth and Legend”, Stara Zagora, Bulgaria (2004).
