Contemporary Istanbul 2018

Presented artists: Maka Batiashvili, Beso Uznadze, Irakli Bugiani, Levan Mindiashvili and Maya Sumbadze

Maka Batiashvili (B. 1975, Tbilisi, Georgia)

Batiashvili accomplished her Bachelor degree in Fine Art at the Tbilisi State Academy of Arts in 1997 and since then she works in graphical drawing, oil painting, photography and film. Her exuberant work depicts scenes from the everyday. Through the subject matter, Batiashvili poses questions around the existential issues of life and death. In her work the everyday life resembles a playground, where various scenes are being performed. Ostensibly unmediated figures and the intense color scheme in Batiashvili's work share stylistic tendencies with the early modernist painting traditions of Georgia and Europe. Batiashvili's practice is an interesting cross between the traditional and the contemporary painting, developing the well-established tradition of painting popular in the republic of Georgia.
Maka Batiashvili lives and works in Tbilisi, Georgia.

Selected solo and group exhibitions:
2018 Contemporary Istanbul , 2017 Art Bienale Beijing, 2017 Exhibition of Drawings, Moving Gallery by Project ArtBeat, Tbilisi, Georgia, The Sunchild Film Festival in Yerevan, Armenia – “Force and Weakness”.The Washington Film Festival in Atlanta - “The Sorrowful Melodies of a Land filled with Sunshine”The Spectrum Gallery, London - an exhibition of paintings by Georgian artists.The Hobby Gallery in Tbilisi, Georgia – a joint exhibition of paintings.The Blumen Gallery, Leipzig - a solo exhibition 2015 – START Art Fair, Saatchi Gallery, London, UK; Playground, TBC Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia; Exhibition of Georgian Painters, Contemporary Art Center, Tel Aviv, Israel; 2013 - Untitled, Arundel Gallery, Arundel, UK; 2012 - Untitled, Industrial Gallery, Ostrava, the Czech Republic; 2011 - Black and White, Tbilisi History Museum, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2008 - OFF EUROPA Festival, Leipzig, Germany; Photography Exhibition, National Museum, Atlanta, USA.


Bezo Uznadze  (B. 1968, Tbilisi, Georgia)

Uznadze's new series unites digitally modified photography and mixed media canvases inspired by a flower garden at night that the artist came across accidentally. Overlaid images with semi-transparent layers, dramatically modified color gradations, intensely close up compositions create a sensation of mysterious, yet a splendid garden that the audience only gets a fragmented look of. However, the enchanting beauty of the works is heavy with melancholia. There is a pertinent sensation of loss and lifelessness that infiltrate the images and add on to the drama.
Majority of the artist’s art, is inspired by autobiographical events that find their resolution in his art. The artist channels his vulnerability to create complex imagery that plays on the notions of revealing and concealing and expresses the complexity of human emotional spectrum…the encounters that arouse contradictory feelings, collisions that deeply shake the soul and then memories that sediment as ephemeral visions…
Beso Uznadze lives and works London, UK. 

Selected solo and group exhibitions:
2017 Forgotten Vistas, Moving Gallery by Project ArtBeat, Tbilisi, Georgia, 2016 START Art Fair, Saatchi Gallery, London, UK,. 2016 KONTAKTPHOTOS, Black & White Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2015 Un Homme, Chapitre III, Galerie Hors-Champs, Paris, France; 2014 Artisterium, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2011 Tbilisi photo Festival, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2011 Les Rencontres De La Photographie, Arles, France; 2010 Artisterium, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2009 The International Festival of Photography, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, Italy; 2008 Taylor-Wessing Photographic Competition, National Portrait Gallery, London, UK; 2004 Schweppes Photographic Competition, National Portrait Gallery, London, UK. 


Irakli Bugiani (B. 1980, Tbilisi, Georgia)

Irakli Bugiani mainly works in painting. He also refers to the techniques of collage. For the pictures he uses old and new photos, texts about the events happening around him for example in social, scientific, political situations. The process itself and its visibility on the canvas is very important for the artist. His works depict interiors and exteriors of architecture empty of human presence. The abstract imagery composed with rough strokes of oil on canvas leave an impression of the yet unfinished work in process. The artist deliberately leaves fragments of working process on the canvas as if the artworks are endless. The impressionistic 'unfinished' seascapes, washed out portraits and collages of fragmented imagery compose the exploration into the boundaries of fiction and historical fact of one's memory.

Selected solo and group exhibitions:
2015 - Heritage, RICHMIX Arts Centre, London, UK; 2014 -Crossing the boundaries, AT388, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 2013 - Kunstpreis Junger Westen 2013, Kunsthalle Recklinghausen, Recklinghausen, Germany; 2012 - Post Coitum Omne Animal Triste Est, Damenundherren e.V., Dusseldorf, Germany; 2011 - Zwischen Gestern und Morgen, Gallery 10, Karlsruhe, Germany.


Levan Mindiashvili (B. 1979, Tbilisi, Georgia)

Mindiashvili emerged as an artist in Germany, while starting to participate in various art-related projects. Since moving to Buenos Aires in 2008 Mindiashvili completed his postgraduate studies in the field of multidisciplinary projects at Buenos Aires Art University.

His multidisciplinary approach can be seen not only in his artistic practice, but also in his professional practice overall. In 2009 - 2012 Mindiashvili worked as a curator and executive director at Laguanacazul Art Gallery, Buenos Aires. At the same time, he worked as a performer artist at Ensamble Caustico, Buenos Aires.
Mindiashvili's artistic research covers topics such as memory and identity - the theme so actual in today's post-Soviet reality of the country, where the so-called transmission period of the 90s has left its fatal traces on the identity of the place.

In Mindiashvilis' practice, research into both memory and identity start to come up, in the first place, at the subjective level, while questioning the border of the private and the public in the same way as subjective/objective dichotomy.

Mindiashvilis series of mixed-media works private/public, subject/object dichotomies remind us of a yet another issue of the so-called post-Soviet crisis of the region.
Levan Mindiashvili currently lives and works in New York. He is represented by The Lodge Gallery, New York.


Maya Sumbadze (B. 1972, Tbilisi, Georgia)

Maya Sumbadze is a multimedia artist who works in painting, drawing, video, installation, audio, computer graphics. Artist takes inspiration from childhood memories, imprinted in mind images, outside colors, shapes, lighting and sound. Different atmospheres created in everyday life, various works of art and working materials inspire her and dictate the artist how to form a picture. Her works often have strange characters: a girl who has wings and mechanical engine, a printing machine, glittering necklaces pasted to thin paper.

Selected solo and group exhibitions:
2014 - Untold Stories, Video ArtLab., Europe House, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2013 - Pulsart Restart, East Mission Project, Schio, Italy, 2013 - Take me Out, Artarea Gallery, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2012 - Tamada's Tutorial, Gallery Meet Factory, Prague, Czech Republic; 2011 - On the Way, Center of Contemporary Art, Tbilisi, Georgia; 2009 - Born In Georgia, CoBra Museum, Amstelveen, Netherlands.