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From Impressionism to cyber art: Modern art is translated into Georgian for the first time

By Nino Gvalia

Not long ago the first Georgian textbook about the art of XX Century finally saw daylight at the Book House at Gamsakhurdia Avenue. The book, sponsored by the Public Affairs Section of the U.S. Embassy, gives an overview of versatile artists and art movements - from Impressionism to cyber art…

"To my mind, this book will be useful for Georgian students as it is written in their native language," said author Ketevan Kintsurashvili, an art historian and senior researcher at the Georgian Art History Institute. "This is a book written using modern language, designed for modern students," explained the author and added that this textbook may also be translated into English.

The author has a history of bridging Georgian-American cultural relations and in 1995, Kintsurashvili delivered a series of lectures at Mount Holyoke College about the Russian and Georgian avant-garde in the early 20th century - a theme which was received with keen interest by university students there. From 2003-2004, she was a Fulbright Scholar.

"I am stuck by Russian and Georgian art and its brilliance," Kintsurashvili remembers one of the students saying, while another was so inspired by Russian constructivism that he made a sculpture using constructivist principles and presented it to his professor.

As the art historian told The Messenger, during Soviet times it was almost impossible to learn about modern art, as the regime was not fond of disseminating information about contemporary art movements. There was a big vacuum in which artists and art historians lived as if nothing was happening in modern culture. Even those who were interested in contemporary creative processes and persistent and resourceful and willing to engage in subterfuge could hardly get black-and-white Xerox copies about these "horrible" art forms and artists.

"In the 60s my father brought a modern art catalogue with color illustrations from the USA," recalled Kintsurashvili, explaining that this 'treasure-volume' became one of the rare sources of information for a number of Georgian artists.

Several years after the collapse of the Soviet regime, Ketevan Kintsurashvili had a chance to continue her artistic research abroad. She has made use of grants from the Soros Foundation in Prague, and USIA/IREX in Washington and in 1998 through the Regional Scholar Exchange Program Kintsurashvili went to Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut to research American abstract expressionism and its influence on Georgian art.

Ketevan Kintsurashvili was particularly interested in the high-profile Georgian painter David Kakabadze (1889 - 1952) and especially in his abstract works, which had not been researched at all. So, the art expert set about revealing the importance and originality of these works.

While in the U.S. Kintsurashvili delivered a lecture at the Yale University about Kakabadze and the development of his work focusing in detail on his only sculpture "Z" (or "The Speared Fish"), which is included in the collection of the "Societe Anonyme" at Yale University art gallery. Before this lecture, the sculptor of "Z" had been identified as Russian, but after Ketevan's talk, the word "Russian" was changed into "Georgian." The newly published textbook features Kakabadze's 16 watercolors from the Yale University collection - works which have been reprinted for the first time with the university's special agreement.

"Art is an indicator - it illustrates the way society thinks," says Kintsurashvili who hopes that this "newborn" textbook will help students to gain information and become more educated, modern and creative.

This article was originally published by The Messenger, Georgia.