Nada Willa Warsaw
Gallery Artbeat presents recent artworks of Tamuna Chabashvili and Salome Chigilashvili for Nada Willa Warsaw 2024.
Tamuna Chabashvili’s practice revolves around the topic of archives and traces. She uses textile to mark or record trails of certain events from a personal perspective, turning it into a temporary platform or a space to convey one’s own story and resist disappearance. In Tamuna Chabashvili’s projects, a body and the idea of a house often mingle and echo each other. On many occasions, a body becomes the tool to measure and recreate materials that are invisible to an external eye, yet that are still there and palpable under the skin, in the form of memories. This time, the numerous layers of a personal and collective history of trauma and (forced) displacement take the form of minimal and deliberately simple signs, dense in their dryness. The works result from a process of removal and distillation, rather than the accumulation of traces and documents: there is a search for essentiality. Each blanket with its bright colors and geometric motifs hosts specific prints, intentionally abstract at first sight. The titles of the pieces help us to identify what we are looking at, while the signs of use on the blankets are clues to the existence of layered history.
Tamuna Chabashvili is a visual artist based in Tbilisi and Amsterdam. She received her B.A. in Fine Arts from the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam, NL. In 2003 she co-founded the artists' initiative 'Public Space With A Roof' (PSWAR) in Amsterdam. From 2003-2007 it functioned as a project space. PSWAR projects have been shown internationally at the Frederick Kiesler Foundation in Vienna, Austria and at the Centre Pompidou-Metz in France, among other places. Her project Supra of Her Own was exhibited at the Nerctar Gallery Tbilisi, 2014, the Kuad Gallery as the parallel program of the 14th Istanbul Biennial, and the Kyiv Biennial, 2015. Her recent archival projects include Corridors of Conflict Abkhazia 1989-1995, 2019, Literature Museum, Tbilisi, and Missing Monument website, 2020.
Salome Chigilashvili's artistic repertoire beautifully integrates construction materials such as brick, thread, and embroidery on fabric. Her captivating work explores the interplay between these seemingly disparate elements. By skill fully juxtaposing architecture and embroidery, the exhibition transcends the boundaries between these disciplines. Chigilashvili's collaborative artworks vividly illustrate the harmonious relationship between brickwork and embroidery, showcasing their diverse textures, colors, and intricate patterns. Her innovative approaches push the boundaries of artistic mediums, sparking meaningful dialogue, encouraging interdisciplinary exploration, and exemplifying the lasting relevance of these materials.
Salome Chigilashvili is Georgian visual artist, born in 1996 in Tbilisi, Georgia. She graduated from Visual Arts, Architecture & Design School – VA[A]DS of Free University of Tbilisi. She is a multimedia artist, works in different mediums including sculpture, painting, found objects. As a material she often uses threads and plaster.
2023 - “Belly Hair”, Gallery Artbeat, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2022 - “All Songs Die As Soon As They Are Forgotten”, Gallery Artbeat, Tbilisi, Georgia; “XX-XXI, Georgian Art from Private Collections”, D. Shevardnadze National Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2021 - “Distant Symphony” by ROOMSSTUDIO, Emma Scully Gallery, New York, USA; “Someplace Else”, in collaboration with ROOMS STUDIO, Bazaleti Village, Georgia; 2020 - “Nine Lipped Goddess”, Gallery Artbeat, Tbilisi, Georgia; “Essential Rituals”, 4710 Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2019 - “Crosscurrents”, 68 Projects Gallery, Berlin, Germany; “Tabula Rasa”, Kunsthalle Tbilisi, Georgian National Museum, Tbilisi, Georgia; “Stitching Stones”, collaboration with Situationist, Somerset House, London, England; “Artisterium”, Tbilisi 11th International Contemporary Art Exhibition, Georgian National Museum, Tbilisi History Museum (Karvasla), Tbilisi, Georgia; 2018 - Oxygen Tbilisi_No Fair, Stamba D Block, Tbilisi, Georgia; “All And Everything”, Artarea Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia.