Dominic-Petru Virtosu - born in Bucharest, Romania in 1983 - he works and lives in Roubaix, France, since 2018. He completed his formal artistic education with a License in painting (2006) class of renowned Romanian artist Florin Ciubotaru and a Master’s in 2013 with professor Catalin Balescu at the Bucharest National University of Arts; also attending a semester as an Erasmus exchange student at the prestigious Hochschule fur Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig where he was guided by the style and color of his professor, Annette Schroter.
Before becoming a full-time artist and later a tenured professor at the Ecole Superieure d’Art de Dunkerque/Tourcoing, in Northern France, Virtosu spent six years working in broadcast television and advertising. That experience refined his sensitivity to the seductive and absurd power of pop imagery – its immediacy, its cultural saturation and its potential to both reflect and distort contemporary life. These sensibilities permeate his canvases in unexpected and often humorous ways.
Virtosu’s paintings invite viewers to inhabit the tension between the familiar and the fantastically strange. In this shifting space, his work reveals not only how we construct the world around us, but also how endlessly it can be reinvented.
Virtosu’s artistic practice includes regular exhibition activity (both as solo-shows and in group events) in France and abroad. Most notable exhibitions include:
2025
Peindre Encore, Galerie Commune de l'ESA, Tourcoing, France (group show);
De l’Amour, Verderonne Art Centre, Verderonne, France - curator Caroline Corre (group show)
AAF, Amsterdam, Netherlands ( ArtLef Gallery)
2024
O’Bazaar Fair, Lille, France (group show)
Le Chant du Monde, Chateau de Bourgogne, Estaimpuis, Belgium (group show)
2023
Solo Show at KI Gallery, Paris, France
Renouveau, Chateau Bac-Saint-Maur, Sailly sur la Lys, France (group show)
2022
Solo Show, Impulse Gallery, Lucerne, Switzerland - Curator by Zhuang Hong-Yi
Coexistence, Istanbul Atatürk Cultural Centre, Istanbul - Turkey curator Beste Gürsu (group show)
AAF Brussels, ArtLef Gallery/Groeningen, Brussels, Belgium - curator Paul LaPoutre (group show)
2021
Hauts les Coeurs, Verderonne Art Centre, Verderonne, France - curator Caroline Corre (group show)
Retrouvailles, Collégiale Gallery, Lille, France - curator Veronique Dalle (group show)
2020
New Image Come Back, Galerie 36Bis, Tourcoing, France – curator Eric Harasym (group show)
2019
Sea of Flowers, Dock Gallery, Rotterdam, Netherlands – curator Zhuang Hong-Yi (group show)
2018
Point d‘Eau, Nasbinals, Lozère, France – curator Dominic Vîrtosu (group show)
Avez-vous un motif ?, Frontieres Art Gallery, Lille, France – curator Janusz Stega (group show)
2017
Going Strong, Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania
2016
Arta la Fereastra, Simeza Gallery, Bucuresti, Romania – curators: Anca Boeriu and Corina Gabriela Duma
PAIN / TING, Polytechnic University of Bucharest, Romania
2015
Convergent, Vasile Grigore Museum of Art, Bucharest, Romania
Here & Now, Academy of Economic Studies, Bucharest, Romania – curator Laura Buzatu
« Art Safari » Bucharest, Romania – with the Focus Art from Cluj-Napoca (group show)
2013
In search – Romanian National Library, Bucharest, Romania (group show)
2012
We are here – Erasmus Exhibition, “Căminul Artei” Gallery, Bucharest, Romania (group show)
Semesterausstellung, Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, Leipzig, Germany – curator Prof. Annette Schröter (group show)
Constantly out-of-space – exhibition at the “Residency Blumen”, Leipzig, Germany (group show)
The Wall that Sucks, Erasmus exhibition, Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, Leipzig, Germany (group show)
2011
Color, “Shift” Pub, Bucharest, Romania (solo show)
E-Bienale – International Music Festival George Enescu, Bucharest, Romania – curator Ilina Schileru (group show)
2010
Police the Police – Young Artists Biennial / Portfolio Review Section, , Bucharest, Romania – curator Mica Gherghescu (group show)
...After Crémaster – “Caminul Artei” Gallery, Bucharest, Romania – curator Prof. Cătălin Bălescu (group show)
Identities - “Orizont” Gallery, Bucharest, Romania (group show)
2009
Hau Uan Dăr Ful – “Sigma” Gallery, Bucharest, Romania (solo show)
World Wide View - “Opera” Gallery, Budapest, Hungary (group show)
2006
Painting - Art Jazz Club, Bucharest, Romania (group show)
Cats of War – “Galeria” Gallery, Bucharest, Romania– text by Mica Gherghescu (solo show)