Born to an upper middle class family in Bacau, Romania, Dimitrie Berea became an artist who would later be known by some persons as painter to the aristocratic and royal families of Europe and the art world of France and America. His father was a lawyer-politician, and his mother was a painter trained at the French Ecole des Beaux Arts. Many parents would consider art a less than suitable career choice, but Dimitrie's maternal family had been involved in the arts for a number of generations.

So at the age of nineteen, Dimitrie entered the Academy of Architecture, in Bucharest where he spent the next five years. While in the Academy, he and his master teacher, Theodorescu-Sion and a student friend, fou...