About Sights – St. George’s Church and Monastery complex in the village of Ubisa
Ubisa (Georgian: უბისა) is a small village and medieval monastic complex in the Imereti region of Georgia, about 25 km from the town of Kharagauli. The monastic complex comprises the 9th-century St. George’s Monastery founded by St. Gregory, a tower and fragments of a 12th-century defensive wall. The four-storey tower was built by Simon Chkondideli … Read more
About Art – Vasil Roinashvili (ვასილ როინაშვილი)
Vasil Roinashvili (ვასილ როინაშვილი) (1879-1958) studied the basics of photography in the studio of the famous Georgian photographer Alexander Roinashvili before traveling to Europe and Russia. In 1905 he returned to his homeland, settled in Telavi and married Sophio Kazakhashvili. He built a house and made a photo studio on the first floor. He also created a garden that … Read more
About History – 19th Century Georgia in The Illustrated London News
Established by printer and newsagent Herbert Ingram The Illustrated London News was the world’s first illustrated weekly newspaper. The first issue appeared on Saturday 14 May 1842 and by 1863 the newspaper was selling more than 300,000 copies every week, a huge circulation in comparison to other British newspapers of the time. From about 1890 onward The Illustrated London News made increasing … Read more
About Art – Ivan Petrovich Pranishnikoff
Ivan Petrovich Pranishnikoff was born in Kursk in Russia in 1841. During his life he was a painter, businessman, journalist, illustrator, cartoonist, translator, friend of Turgenev and friend and official painter of Tsar Alexander III. He fought for the unification of Italy alongside Garibaldi, and participated in the war of independence of Montenegro. Pranishnikoff was … Read more
About History – The Photography of Dmitri Ermakov
Dmitri Ivanovich Ermakov was born in Tiflis (the old name for Tbilisi) in Georgia in 1846. After graduating from the military topographic academy in Ananuri he opened his own photographic studio in Tiflis and by the end of the 1870s he was a renowned photographer, winning awards in many exhibitions in Moscow, Italy, Turkey and … Read more
About History – Photographs of Vittorio Sella
In 1889-1896 the famous mountain-climber and pioneer of photography, Count Vittorio Sella made a number of climbs in the Caucasus Mountains in the Svaneti region of Georgia. Over his lifetime, Sella photographed many of the major mountain ranges all over the world and his pictures were exhibited by the Royal Geographical Society. In his earliest climbs … Read more
About Art – “Statue of Love” in Batumi
A 7 meter steel sculpture of a man and a woman stands on the seashore boulevard of Batumi (Georgian: ბათუმი) on the Black Sea coast of Georgia. Created by Georgian artist Tamar Kvesitadze (Georgian: თამარ კვესიტაძე), the figures move toward each other and merge into one piece every 10 minutes. The Statue of Love sculpture (Georgian: სიყვარულის ქანდაკება) is inspired by the … Read more
About Art – Niko Pirosmani
Over the course of a brief and often impoverished life, self-taught Georgian artist Niko Pirosmani (Niko Pirosmanashvili) (Georgian: ნიკო ფიროსმანი) produced an immense number of paintings, many of which have been lost over time. Posthumously, his reputation grew when his naïve style became admired in the art circles of Paris after the end of the First World War. Naïve art is a … Read more
About Shopping – Tbilisi Outdoor Art Market
The open-air Dry Bridge Market by the Mtkvari river (on the “Dry Overpass” and surrounding areas) has become the city’s unofficial art bazaar. Here you can find paintings, sculpture, beautiful carvings, exquisite icons, pottery and fabrics. The work is amazing and prices are reasonable.
