Radi Nedelchev

Who was Radi Nedelchev?

Radi Nedelchev is a Bulgarian artist best known as a painter of naïve art. His paintings depict mostly landscapes, village life and festivals.

Nedelchev was born in the village of Ezerche, a mixed community of Christians and Muslims, 50 km from the river port of Rousse on the Danube. His family were farmers and peasant artisans, his mother a weaver and his father a wood carver. From an early age Nedelchev was a compulsive drawer.

At fifteen, after a quarrel with his father, Nedelchev ran away from home to the Black Sea coast, taking various jobs to survive. At eighteen, he was conscripted into the army for three years of national service. On completion, he enrolled at the newly formed state art school in Rousse where he met painter Marko Monev and shared a studio.

In 1963 Nedelchev and Monev journeyed widely through rural Bulgaria, sketching and painting, and attempting to make contact with other artists as they travelled. This period in Bulgarian history was a time when the conditions of the peasantry were being vastly transformed by the collectivisation process, Nedelchev and Monev observed the dying ways and traditions and this is reflected in their works. In 1964 the two ended their travels back at the Danube. Nedelchev was befriended by the artist Trifon Nikolov, and for a time lived and painted in his studio.