Skip to main content

Exhibition of Shalva Kikodze in Tbilisi



An exhibition of Shalva Kikodze’ works, entitled ‘Shalva Kikodze 120’ will be held from 25 December 2015 to 10 February 2016 in the Shevardnadze National Gallery in Tbilisi. The 120 in the title of the exhibition represents the 120th anniversary in 2014 of Shalva Kikodze’s birth.

Curated by Maya Tsitsishvili, Irine Abesadze and Nino Chogoshvili, there are more than 300 works of art exhibited, from his caricatures to his Parisian paintings and sketches.

Kikodze was born in 1894 in the village of Bakhvi, Guria, in the Ozurgeti district of Georgia. In 1914 he enrolled in Moscow University in the law faculty – and in the same year he published his first caricatures in the magazine Lakhti (The Girdle). By 1916 he changed to Moscow’s Art School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. In 1918 he returned to Tbilisi to work on other artistic magazines, such as ‘Theatre and Life,’ ‘Theatre and Music,’ ‘Art’ and the satirical magazine called ‘The Devil’s Whip.’



In January 1920 he arrived in Paris due to a scholarship awarded by the Georgian Ministry of Public Education – as an expressionist painter, graphic artist, and theatre decorator. He worked at the Old Pigeon Theatre, the Odeon, and Atelier in Paris. His most productive period in terms of artistic work was during the (almost) two years in Paris where he met other Georgian artists Dimitri Shevardnadze, Viktor Nozadze, and Geronti Kikodze.

In February 1921 he had a joint art exhibition with noted Georgian artists David Kakabadze and Lado Gudiashvili at the Salon des Independents - Salon of the Independents. In the same year, the same three artists exhibited at La Licorne Gallery in Paris.

On August 11 he arrived in Germany in the resort town of Bad-Neuenahr. He died suddenly in Freiburg, Germany, on November 7, 1921, of tuberculosis (TB) at the age of 27.

He painted everyday scenes of Guria and Abkhazia in 1907, and most his caricatures around 1917, but his best works, I think, are from his years in Paris.


The above Indian ink sketch is Abkhazia, Gudauti (1907).


The above Indian ink sketch is called Konstantine Gamsakhurdia (1917). The sketch below is Veriko Anjaparidze (1917).


The following oil paintings are from Paris in 1920. The first is Artist's Coffee House in Paris, followed by Paris - Garden of Luxembourg, and an Indian ink drawing called Parisian Sketch. The top photograph is of the painting Paris - Eiffel Tower.








MARTINA NICOLLS is the author of:- The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pir-E-Kamil - The Perfect Mentor by Umera Ahmed: book review

The Perfect Mentor pbuh  (2011) is set in Lahore and Islamabad in Pakistan. The novel commences with Imama Mubeen in medical university. She wants to be an eye specialist. Her parents have arranged for her to marry her first cousin Asjad. Salar Sikander, her neighbour, is 18 years old with an IQ of 150+ and a photographic memory. He has long hair tied in a ponytail. He imbibes alcohol, treats women disrespectfully and is generally a “weird chap” and a rude, belligerent teenager. In the past three years he has tried to commit suicide three times. He tries again. Imama and her brother, Waseem, answer the servant’s call to help Salar. They stop the bleeding from his wrist and save his life. Imama and Asjad have been engaged for three years, because she wants to finish her studies first. Imama is really delaying her marriage to Asjad because she loves Jalal Ansar. She proposes to him and he says yes. But he knows his parents won’t agree, nor will Imama’s parents. That
1 comment
Read more

Flaws in the Glass, a self-portrait by Patrick White: book review

The manuscript, Flaws in the Glass (1981), is Patrick Victor Martindale White’s autobiography. White, born in 1912 in England, migrated to Sydney, Australia, when he was six months old. For three years, at the age of 20, he studied French and German literature at King’s College at the University of Cambridge in England. Throughout his life, he published 12 novels. In 1957 he won the inaugural Miles Franklin Literary Award for Voss, published in 1956. In 1961, Riders in the Chariot became a best-seller, winning the Miles Franklin Literary Award. In 1973, he was the first Australian author to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for The Eye of the Storm, despite many critics describing his works as ‘un-Australian’ and himself as ‘Australia’s most unreadable novelist.’ In 1979, The Twyborn Affair was short-listed for the Booker Prize, but he withdrew it from the competition to give younger writers the opportunity to win the award. His autobiography, Flaws in the Glass
Post a Comment
Read more

The Beggars' Strike by Aminata Sow Fall: book review

The Beggar’sStrike (1979 in French and 1981 in English) is set in an unstated country in West Africa in a city known only as The Capital. Undoubtedly, Senegalese author Sow Fall writes of her own experiences. It was also encapsulated in the 2000 film, Battu , directed by Cheick Oumar Sissoko from Mali. Mour Ndiaye is the Director of the Department of Public Health and Hygiene, with the opportunity of a distinguished and coveted promotion to Vice-President of the Republic. Tourism has declined and the government blames the local beggars in The Capital. Ndiaye must rid the streets of beggars, according to a decree from the Minister. Ndiaye instructs his department to carry out weekly raids. One of the raids leads to the death of lame beggar, Madiabel, who ran into an oncoming vehicle as he tried to escape, leaving two wives and eight children. Soon after, another raid resulted in the death of the old well-loved, comic beggar Papa Gorgui Diop. Enough is enou
8 comments
Read more