Artissima 2018
Presented artists: Tamar Chaduneli and Gvantsa Jishkariani
Follow for follow
Follow for follow used as a hashtag represents a digitally made deal between two users: follow and you will be followed. How the gist of the online-made deal is symptomatic of much larger turn within the spheres of art and culture? “What is demanded of artists coming from so-called “peripheral” countries, is that they show that they are different, that they live in contexts totally different from our own. Which proves that they are still seen in relation to the cultural background within which they would otherwise be imprisoned.” Who is “we” – an orientational zero point today, when the question of identity is disappearing in homogeneous fluid of cultural influences, aesthetic trends and digital communications. What is vital – to be at the origin of something, or to become part of something? Georgian artists Tamar Chaduneli and Gvantsa Jishkariani are working on a pattern of continuously recycling and duplicating culture. Their space-oriented installation builds up the question of original and reproduced thought. Multi-layered works of sculpture, drawings, paintings, tapestries are rethinking image production and the language of iconography.
Gvantsa Jishkariani is based in Rustavi, Georgia. After studying at Tbilisi State Academy of Art (BA in Architecture) she gained an Informal MA in Inclusive Mediation at Center of Contemporary Art - Tbilisi. In 2017, she won Tsinandali Award in visual arts. Jishkariani is an artist whose primary medium is installation. Her work addresses first and foremost the topics of expectations, beliefs and taste. The temporary nature of the paradox that arises when searching for concrete definitions of right and wrong, east and west, old and new is one of her subjects of interest. Through her installations, videos and sculptures she takes traditional notions of cultural identity, ancient views, paradoxical beliefs and superstitions and plays with them. Gvantsa’s art is inspired by serendipity and intuition. She starts each work with preconceived composition and idea, but mostly without preliminary sketches. She wonders how ancient superstitions, social media and surrounding trashy images influence on everyday life; how emotions, memories, views and personality is created. Since 2014 she, with ten other female artists is part of an art group New Collective. In 2017, Jishkariani founded Patara Gallery in an underpass shop in Tbilisi, which is a space for experimental, denied or not-yet-seen art and for game-changing young artists. In 2018 Gvantsa co-founded a The Why Not Gallery in Tbilisi, Georgia.
Tamar Chaduneli is a Georgian visual artist, born in 1991, in Rustavi, Georgia. She graduated from Tbilisi State Academy of arts - Media art faculty in 2013 and the same year studied at non formal master program of mediation at Center of Contemporary Art - Tbilisi (CCA-T). In 2017 started school at Staatliche Hochschule fur Bildende Kunste - Staedelschule at Willem de Rooij class. In 2016 Tamar was invited in Dusseldorf, Germany and in 2017 in Kiev, Ukraine as an artist in residency programs. Together with group ‘block 21’ Tamar is cofounder of artist in residency program in Rustavi. Opening of the residency space was part of Tbilisi Triennial program. On conceptual bases her work can be characterized by combination of different media such as sculpture, painting, drawing, video game, animation, procedural installations. Her works investigate language of visual culture and image production. Emulating forms and constructions of everyday object design and architecture from memory and imagination point towards impact specific to surfeit of images we see all around us. Her recent collaborations with craftsmen confront the complexity of digital and technological development in relation to traditional techniques and process of redefining human condition. Tamars work addresses the question of images contributing to construction of identity and how identities are subsumed into larger political and cultural structures.