Acclaimed artist and sculptor, the recipient of the Order of Honor, and the Honored Artist of Georgia, Givi Mizandari had a diverse and prolific life.
He was the first artist from the Soviet Union to be invited as a pedagogue in the 1960s and 1970s to teach the art of sculpture first at the Hanoi Art Institute (Vietnam) and then in Cambodia, at the Royal Art University. In Both institutions, he formed the faculties of sculpture and became a professor at the Royal Art University. From 1970 until his death, he was the dean of the Fine Arts Faculty at the Tbilisi Academy of Arts at the same time heading the academy’s sports club. Besides he was one of the initiators of the revival of rafting in Georgia, a representative of the Red Cross mission, and a war veteran from the Abkhazia war.
His works can be found in museums and cities throughout Georgia, Poland, Hungary, Vietnam, Cambodia, the United States of America, and former Soviet republics.
Among his works are the sculptural composition “Auschwitz will not be repeated” (Poland, Auschwitz Museum), the bust of Ho Chi Minh and the bust of a Mongolian girl; the bust of Mikheil Javakhishvili in Marneuli, Georgia, and the sculpture of Jumber Lezhava as well as the bust of Alexander Chavchavadze in Tsinandali.
source: “Culture Plus”, 2022, Levan Mizandari