
“Brutal Honesty”, “Formal Moral”, “Generational Trauma”: these are some of the slogans Gvantsa Jishkariani embroiders on her works. They also describe the special aura surrounding her art. Jishkariani, who was born the same year that Georgia regained its independence, can indeed be brutally honest, and she does combine formalism with morality, but generational traumas are also reflected in her works. The starting material for these pieces is the decorative tapestries that were popular in the Soviet Union, which the artist deconstructs and processes by applying embroidered mottos. The language she uses, bordering on parody, is a mixture of political banners, academic jargon, and notes from therapy sessions. By juxtaposing post-Soviet material culture with the newspeak of Global English, Jishkariani creates unique, artisanal objects—captivating souvenirs of our contemporary political apocalypse.
Gvantsa Jishkariani (born 1991) studied at the Tbilisi State Academy of Arts and the Center of Contemporary Art Tbilisi. She is an exceptional figure on the Georgian contemporary art scene, known as an artist but also as the creator of the off galleries Patara and The Why Not Gallery. She was the curator of the Tbilisi Photo Festival and founder of Gar-Gar, Georgia’s first magazine on contemporary art and fashion. She currently lives and works between Tbilisi and Madrid. Her works are included in numerous major international collections, such as the Alain Servais Collection, Collezione Taurisano, the Royal Family of UAE Collection and the Marval Collection. In Warsaw her works were shown for the first time at last year’s NADA Villa Warsaw.