“Relics of mine: icons, family photoes, knuchlebones, slings, horse-shoes, ladies’ hats and fans, ancient daggers and sabres… I had been collecting them all my life using them in collages and pop art works, drawing them, never tired of admiring and cherishing them; it seems, the feeling was mutual and they responded with the same kind of attitude, giving me the impitus and inspiration in creative work. Items of Georgian life and everyday existence had always beeb-and shall remain forever-the inseparable issues of my life and creative work”…
Vladimir Kandelaki is an outstanding representative of the generation of Georgian painters from the 1970s. His development as a nonconformist artist began in that period. He mixed traditional Georgian intonations with a variety of new trends and directions. From 1969 to 1990 Vladimir Kandelaki was a member of the USSR Artists’ Union. In 1990 he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of Georgia. In 1993 he became a member of the UNESCO International Federation of Artists. In 1999 Vladimir Kandelaki became Professor of Tbilisi Academy of Fine Arts. His works are preserved in many private collections and also in the museums of Georgia and abroad: Georgian National Museum, Georgian Museum of Fine Arts, Tbilisi; Zimmerli Museum of Art, New Jersey, USA; Cremona Foundation, Maryland, USA (Cremona Foundation Mechanicsville); Tretyakov Gallery and Museum of Oriental Art, Russia.
