Paintings from Georgia
On 28 September an exhibition opened at the Goetheanum of «Contemporary Art from Tbilisi.» Georgia’s ambassador to Switzerland was present.
Valerian Gorgoshidse recited, even celebrated, Georgian poetry in the Goetheanum’s Foundation Stone Auditorium, in a space emerging out of light and colour changes, where the letters of the Georgian alphabet were suspended, into which Lasha Malashkia again and again wove his expressive eurythmy. The entire dramatic and lyrical range of the vocalic Georgian language resonated in the qualities of the sounds, words and rhythms. The planet poems, which were immersed in the corresponding coloured light, could be understood and experienced thanks to the eurythmy gestures.
The pictures of the seven artists who were present at the vernissage and of Irakli Parjiani who died in 1991 are exhibited on the first floor of the Goetheanum. Each of the paintings conveys the deeply religious, icon-like, almost mystical and oriental influence of the vibrant, partly imaginative stories they tell. Looking at these pictures, including the few landscapes, the observer experiences a rich inner life.
A magical, almost oriental world
As we enter the exhibition space, we first gaze at a large painting by Anton Balanchivadze, entitled «On the Eve of Time», which has a Chagall-like quality. It seems to transport us to an archaic fairy world where we are surrounded by beings that seem to speak to us. In Irakli Parjiani’s paintings one senses the artist’s world of experience.
Using light and darkness, he objectifies the experience in a way that lets observers feel they are part of it.
There are also «abstract» paintings. One, by Mischa Pitkhelauri, is entitled «Elements of a Theory of Knowledge of Goethe’s Worldview». It reflects the relationship that forms between the intuitive observer and the grey sensory world that is separate from him. Keti Matabeli takes us into the magical, almost oriental world of the Georgian national epic The Knight in the Panther’s Skin. There are more pictures to discover. To the sensitive observer they will reveal wonderful worlds.