UNLIMITED ABILITIES

In December Women’s Fund and art organisation Geoair have held an exhibition Unlimited Possibilities. The tandem of the two organisations might be surprising for the people who do not know the Geoair well enough. A team of enthusiasts aim at tackling the social problems with the help of art. Their 10 years old biography is full of exciting projects directed at awakening the Georgian society. Hence, the very last one was not an exclusion. The Women’s Fund had found several women with different disabilities willing to get qualification and start a career. The exposition put together by the Geoair team was composed of artists who agreed to donate their work for such an important cause. This act of charity is particularly important, as the raised money won’t be a singular help, rather a means of putting these women back into the reality of the country. Moreover, it acts as a great precedent for other people who thought they were destined for a lifetime in the dark of their apartments. Unfortunately, this is the grim reality of Georgian life for people with disabilities in there. As Nino Chubinishvili, one of the participating artists has cleverly noted, the society that shuts these people is disabled and dysfunctional rather than these people.

Juna Godishvili, 31

Juna wants to advance her knowledge of English and then tutor the elementary school children. She has completed the accounting and computer courses and has an experience of working in various NGOs, even though having a Marfan syndrome.

                                      Marina Gogoberishvili,46

Marina Gogoberishvili has been in a wheelchair for some time already; she has met her husband (also in a wheelchair) in the rehabilitation centre. They have a daughter together. Already in a wheelchair, Marina entered the faculty of physics and mathematics in the university and later transferred to the faculty of fine arts. Last year she participated in the beauty contest where a girl in the wheelchair made her hair and make up.


Levan Mindiashvili

Nana Samushia is 26 and she is the member of “Woman and Reality”. By profession she is a designer. Nana is diagnosed with the total monoplegia of the upper right limb. Nana sews, embroiders, knits, paints. Ana Zakhvatova and Natela Gamidova  are also members of “Woman and Reality” and are among those people who wish to learn Knitting, embroidery and sewing. Ana has the left lower limb poliomyelitis and Natela has the spine trauma.

These women are heroes that despite the indifference and negligence on behalf of society do not lose the optimism and still manage to look forward to future.

Geoair has contacted the artists they cooperate with and find interesting; some of them are quite well known and widely admired  (Yuri Mechitov, Karaman Kutateladze, Mamuka Japaridze)

Lado Pochkhua




Murtaz Shvelidze

Lado Pochkhua and Murtaz Shvelidze have donated art from their recent exhibitions.Others, like Luka Akimidze are the newcomers to the field. The project has its website where the story of these women as well as the catalogue for the art is available. It is also possible to purchase the art online, which for Georgia is yet another innovatory idea. The art enthusiasts are given a chance to buy some amazing art for quite reasonable prices and also feeling their social responsibility fulfilled. The sale will go on for a month.

Moreover, it is a great innovation for the Georgian art market to have an opportunity to shop online for art. I sincerely hope any of the local galleries adopts the idea and starts selling online. 

Some of the art from the catalogue:

Nino Sekhniashvili

Kote Sulaberidze

Mariam Sitchinava

Kote Jincharadze

Nino Chubinishvili (Chubika)

HERE IS THE LINK FOR THE PROJECT, THERE YOU CAN FIND THE INSTRUCTIONS FOR PURCHASING ART: http://unlimitedabilities.wordpress.com/

My Effort to Follow the Footprints

‘I BELIEVE ONE CAN DEVELOP ANYWHERE GIVEN THEY WANT TO,BUT THE WAVELENGTH YOU DECIDE TO STAY ON DEPENDS ON YOU’-Elene Rakviashvili

 

Elene Rakviashvili’s performance commissioned by cARTveli Foundation was brought to London, first showing at the Georgian Christmas Fair and then at the White Cube, Mayfair.

Elene Rakviashvili, trained painter, works on performances, video art, photography, installation and public art. Based in Georgia, the focus of her art is the society and themes having a particular significance locally. Georgia is inexhaustible source of inspiration for the artist and according to her the environment is so complex, diverse and exciting she would never move to other countries. Elene has a very peculiar attitude towards life seeing all the obstacles and disadvantages as the challenges and actually key to her successful career in art. The first happening was also born out of the desperate reality of the 90s Tbilisi engulfed in fear of the ambiguous future. People exiting the underground (one of the few places having electricity) were taken by surprise seeing the brightly lit street with the images shining on the walls. Driven by the intense desire to cheer and give hope to the confused, disoriented and depressed mass, Elene was personally greeting everyone exiting the underground. More than 10 years after the first performance the artist jokes some of her friends still expect her to stop fooling around and start painting.

Academically trained, Elene has managed to escape its daunting restrictions and find herself as a performance artist. Instead of limiting her the artist says it has helped a lot when working in multimedia especially in terms of composition, teaching the discipline and accuracy, making her perceptive and diligent. Elene closely observes her surroundings and picks up on the most problematic issues. Her art revolves around the social themes, questions about identity, gender and tradition. Seeing the potential of art to change the whole epoch and the standpoint of the whole society, Elene fully understands the importance of its engagement with social questions. Disapproving the non-existent spirit of togetherness in the creative circles, the artist also does not like the local indifferent audience, who was way more receiving and participating in 90s.

Her art always draws parallels with the European values with the aim of resurfacing some of the most problematic aspects of Georgian mentality. She works and thinks a lot about broad concepts such as Georgian national identity, as well as specific historical events. The artist masterly incorporates the distinctive nature of Georgia, being at the crossroads of Asian and European cultures. In order to grasp the roots of some of the most perpetuating stereotypes and perceptions, she often time-travels with her art.

In the performance My effort to follow the footprints  Elene in the national costume, hesitantly approaches the Qvevri, traditional wine making vessel, and tries to squeeze into one of them. In the process she takes off the clothes in order to accomplish the impossible task. Taking off the dress she is left in a plain, monochrome costume- faceless, uniform and boring compared to the national dress. Trying to somehow adjust the Qvevri, she breaks it. Then hugging the fragments she tries to get the pieces together. Finally comes the realisation- it is impossible to squeeze through the Qvevri or mend what has been broken. Regretting, with her head down, she ends the performance. It is quite characteristic for the Georgian society to incorporate the foreign habits into its environment flatly. It looks as forced, unnatural and illogical as trying to fit into a piece of pottery. The allegory of Qvevri is a clever choice, because usually very traditional and very distinctively Georgian customs go through these modifications. ‘The influence of the dominating countries has always been present in Georgia. However, a lot of things get lost in attempt to Europeanize the society- traditions, self-awareness, identity’- remarks the artist.

Ironically, Elene Rakviashvili belongs to the small group of Georgian artists who manage to maintain their distinctiveness and at the same time correspond to the European trends and developments in art; and this is so organic, not a bit is forced.

The performance was brought to London by the non-profit foundation ‘cARTveli'. The collective of Ekaterina Moniava, Elizabeth Chachkhiani and Tereza Kandelaki want to promote the Georgian contemporary art abroad. A product of their inexhaustible enthusiasm, it is a series of pop up shows concentrating on some of the most exciting names.

MERAB ABRAMISHVILI AT THE BAIA GALLERY

BAIA GALLERY has hosted an exhibition of Merab Abramishvili. Seeing his work is always a very exciting possibility. The intricate craftsmanship, astonishing colour palette, carefully planned compositions and the naïve looking subject matters never fail to capture the heart of the audience. Having a very distinct painting style, Abramishvili belongs to the alternative art scene of the 80s Georgia. This group is a very significantly interested in religion, often employing it as their subject matter- a kind of protest against the Soviet dismissal of religion and their forced recreation of the national identity.

Abramishvili’s themes are particularly fascinating when analysed in relation to the context of Georgia when he was painting. The country was engulfed in crisis of all sorts. The Soviet Union broke down causing unrest, civil war and Abkhazian conflict; the decade of darkness arrived, with no electricity, hunger and death. Surrounded by this, Abramishvili found an escape route in his mythological and biblical scenes, the heavenly animals and rocking maidens. Abramishvili’s canvases radiated hope against the total agony- hence his charm.

‘The art of 80s fetishizes the idea of escapism, of creating the ideal world and moving to there. There is a shared desire of opposing the prevalent deconstructionism with the universal values. The artists of 80s [Georgians] did not come protesting, but came with a position. Almost everywhere else in the post-Soviet countries, the protest against the environment was reactionary, aggressive, reflexive and poster-like, similar to the objective surroundings. However, in here the more critical the environment, the more stable, harmonious and balanced was the art world.’- writes Baia Tsikoridze, the owner of the Baia Gallery. Instead of focusing and almost copying the chaos around, these artists were evoking the values that would save the society. These were the illusions of beauty, serenity and stability, calmness, kindness and steadiness; Abramishvili’s canvases are infused with. Emphasis on aestheticism was the protest against the rundown, discouraged, destitute society. 

The painter has themes he often returns to; the exotic animals are quite attractive for the artist. Repainting the lions, tigers and leopards the painter saw the far lands of Africa as the only faint imitation of heaven; when little, he famously was saving the pocket money to travel to there.

Abramishvili was a student of Alexander Bandzeladze, a celebrated abstract painter; probably it was Bandzeladze who inspired Abramishvili to be so sensitive towards colour. Abramishvili’s palette is always a very distinctively intellectual; even the bright pinks are used in such combinations that crate a very darbaiseli harmony. The two-dimensionality of Abramishvili’s paintings are definitely an influence of his genius mentor.

Abramishvili’s painting technique is a very distinctive one. Working in tempera and watercolours, the painter employed and arguably revived the gesso technique; deeply inspired by the fresco painting, which is not surprising as Georgia has a centuries old fresco painting tradition. The father of the painter, Guram Abramishvili was an art historian and had expeditions on historical sites such as the Ateni Sioni, where young Merab was busy inspecting and producing the copies of frescos and arguably falling in love with them. Later on Abramishvili got interested and has researched fundamentally the Persian miniature paintings. His art is an astonishing hybrid of the Georgian fresco and Eastern miniature paintings. Scrupulous attention to every detail, the transparent washes lit up by the egg glazing speak of a very demanding and disciplined painter.

Even though the exposition was hastily organised, lacked logic and did not last long enough, it was still breath-taking to see Abramishvili canvases publicly, as not even the best reproductions do justice to the originals. These exquisite paintings that ought to be hung in the museum unfortunately only get exhibited in the private Salons, usually pre-sale. Abramishvili is very popular among the Georgian collectors and recently he has been included in the Sotheby’s sales. First it was sold At the Crossroads exhibition, the Maneater of Kumaon and the Piano has just recently been sold on the Russian Art auction, Sotheby’s.