Tonitza Nicolae (1886-1940, born in Barlad). Romanian painter, drawing artist, art critic. He studied at the Fine Arts Academy in Iassy; the Bavarian Royal Academy in Munich (1908); then in Paris (1909-1911), working in different studios and copying various masterpieces. His esthetic options were built around the problems of Impressionism, the achievments of the Post-Impressionists, the decorative trends of Modern Style. His equilibrium, his hedonism, his tempered sensitiveness are turned into the brilliancy of light and colour in the harmony between colour and line. He published satyrical drawings and articles, in various magazines of his time. Beyond the everyday torments, his painting remained serene, expressing a classicist artistic ideal. We can notice the landscapes from Dobrogea, his clowns, children, women portraits.