Monday, October 12, 2009

ART: Aristerium Brings the Art World to Georgia. By Lizaveta Zhahanina (geotimes.ge)

Art and the act of creating it, the real and the perceived, the public and the artist, the material and the intangible, coalesce in a cacophony of paintings, sculptures, videos, installations and performances at the international exhibition of contemporary art, Aristerium 2009. Organised by the Aristerium Association and the Ministry of Culture, Monument Protection and Sport of Georgia, this second annual event opened in the Karvasla Tbilisi History Museum on Friday, October 9.

The theme of Aristerium 2009, which will continue to enchant the public through Sunday, October 18, is “The Manifest of Changes and the Inner Experience.” Art, as a product of reality digested through an artist’s personal experience, reflects the ever-changing world, shedding new light on human experience and understanding. “They [artists] are researching our world and giving it back to us,” said Benjamin Godsill, curator from the United States. “Perhaps it is not the same kind of research as an economist or a development official [would do] but they [artists] might still find things, and point at things in an oblique way, that otherwise wouldn’t be found.”

Aristerium 2009 has attracted artists, groups of artists, curators and critics from 23 countries including Armenia, Azerbaijan, France, Germany, U.S., U.K., Poland, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Turkey, Czech Republic, South Korea, New Zealand, Lithuania, Ireland, Australia, Russia and Georgia. This art forum not only allows international artists to exhibit their work but also provides a venue for them to exchange ideas and insights on the state of contemporary art.

Thus, Aristerium 2009 began with a conference entitled “Beyond or Above Civilization” held at the National Museum Auditorium on Thursday, October 8. “We were trying to determine where we are now in our art,” said Ana Riaboshenko, a Georgian artist and one of the conference’s organisers. “Of course we have a great past, we have beautiful things in our culture, but at the moment we are on a path to somewhere new, we do not know where we are, so we have to find out.”

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