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Rusudan Gachechiladze – Retrospective

20 January 2023 16:00 - 4 February 2023 18:00

 

Rusudan Gachechiladze, a modernist sculptor and the reformer of the Georgian portrait sculpture, belongs to the generation of artists of the 60s of the last century. (She was born in 1936 and graduated from the Tbilisi Academy of Arts in 1962).   Still at a very young age she rejected the superficially perceived realism and attached the primary properties of magic and vitality to statuary at the same time experimenting with the material; namely, introducing polychromy and turning the intermediate matter of gypsum into the final one by giving it the texture of either marble, terracotta, or bronze.

Rusudan Gachechiladze belongs to a small group of sculptors who made an unbiased choice for an artistic path in life in both the Soviet and Post-Soviet eras. Thus, despite the indisputable recognition of her talent, she never had any state commission for the implementation of a monumental form, hence, none of her sculptures stand in public spaces – the field of her artistic activity was centered solely on portraiture and small statuary.

In the 1990s, the best state-owned bronze statues by Gachechiladze were lost in the situation of social unrest, lawlessness and arbitrariness. Today only the plaster casts remain from the oeuvre of the artist. Among the bronze works by the sculptor the portrait of Beisik Karanauli has survived alone which is on display in the David Kakabadze Fine Arts Gallery in Kutaisi.

In the new millennium, after finishing her teaching activities, Rusudan Gachechiladze created a series of paper sketches for modernist sculptures. The main motifs of her graphic art are the images of athletes, warriors, reclining figures, “Street Madonnas”, war memorials as well as abstract forms and angels.Rusudan’s oeuvre is not large. The graphic works amount approximately 150. The portrait sculptures and small statuary are about 35.

The current show is the artist’s first retrospective in the National Gallery. The exhibition is supported by the Ministry of Culture of Georgia. The album “Rusudan Gachechiladze – Unknown Modernist” was published as part of the competition announced by the Ministry of Culture of Georgia – “Promoting the publication of anniversary books-albums in the field of fine and applied arts”. In December 2022, the Ministry of Culture purchased three statues of Rusudan Gachechiladze for museum funds: the portrait of Otar Chiladze, the portrait of Muraz Japaridze and the portrait of Dato Jmukhadze.

Details

Start:
20 January 2023 16:00
End:
4 February 2023 18:00
Event Categories:
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Website:
http://museum.ge

Organizer

Georgian National Gallery
Phone:
+ (995 32) 215 73 00

Venue

Georgian National Gallery
11 Rustaveli ave
Tbilisi, Georgia 0179
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