Exhibition / Publication
September 1999 – November 2000
Schiltigheim, Bilbao, Marne-la-Vallée, Rethymnon
ARTISTS: Manana Dwali, Shalva Khakhanashvili, Koka Ramishvili, Oleg Timchenko, Niko Tsetskhladze, Iliko Zautashvili
CURATOR : Anne Tronche, art critic
September – October 1999 Schiltigheim, Biennale Mitteleuropa
November 1999 Bilbao, International Film Festival
March – April 2000 Marne-la-Vallée
October – November 2000 Rethymnon, Crete
“This exhibition brings together six artists from Georgia; for more than ten years they have been strengthening their language in both formal and theoretical terms in an analysis of their own identity at a time when, in order to exist, their national culture has to cope with a difficult economic and social environment. Using tools common to a whole generation, they broach the codification of the installation – photo / text / object / video – in the style of episodes of awareness which sometimes appear to blur the generally accepted distinctions between private and social space.
Most of the artists gathered here worked together in the eighties under the name of the “10th Floor Group”, which referred to the location of the studio they shared in 1987. Since then they have travelled, mainly in Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark, taking advantage of the period of perestroika. This frequently modified their mode of expression and increased their need to communicate. Thus we are able to understand that the words which often play an essential role in their works correspond to a survival strategy, a need for a type of confrontation allowing the use of speech, which had long been stifled.”
WITH THE SUPPORT OF :
French Ministry of Foreign Affairs/French Association of Artistic Action
General Council of Seine-et-Marne
SAN of Marne-de-la-Vallée/Val Maubuée
City of Schiltigheim
City of Strasbourg
City of Bilbao
City of Rethymnon
Greek Ministry of Culture
National Cities’ Network, Greece