This fall, the exhibition The Avant-Garde in Georgia (1900-1936) will open the europalia georgia festival with the presentation of a largely forgotten chapter in the history of European avant-garde art.

After the fall of the Russian Empire and the October Revolution, Georgia declared independence in 1918. This enchanted interlude lasted only a short time before the Soviet invasion of 1921. Nevertheless, it allowed for an abundance of inspiring avant-garde creations. It was, notably, at the many taverns and cafés in Kutaïssi and in the capital, Tbilisi, that artists met, gathered and organised multidisciplinary events that resulted in new artistic practices. The numerous collaborations took many forms and mixed Georgian traditions with Western and Eastern influences. They interacted in paintings, drawings, writing, films, photographs, performances, typographical experimentations, publications and plays. Movements as diverse as (Neo-)Symbolism, Futurism, Dadaism, Zaum, Everythingism, Expressionism, Cubo-Futurism all coexisted in an unprecedented creative effervescence.

The avant-garde in Georgia will be traced through more than 200 works, presented for the first time in Belgium, coming mainly from the Georgian Museum of Fine arts, the Art Palace of Georgia, the David Kakabadze Foundation and private collections.

Also at Bozar, contemporary artist Meggy Rustamova Adeishvili will present her new film Deda Ena, which examines her mother’s deportation under Stalin’s regime, during the 1950s, from Tbilisi to Kazakhstan, an echo of the many displacements currently happening in the region and around the world.

Curators: Nana Kipiani, Irine Jorjadze and Tea Tabatadze, in collaboration with europalia.

An exhibition by europalia