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Contemporary Art Archive - Tbilisi

Archive of Academic Writings

2021 Edition of the Project is supported by the Ministry of Culture, Sport and Youth of Georgia

A Mad Tea Party

Installation,Object

Lia Bagrationi

installation view
2018

How many labels were tattooed on goddesses? How many types of bodies they were harnessed to? How many uniforms they had to fit in? How many archetypes they had to embody and what kind of paths they took before having this cup of tea: Emigration? Epos? Cradles? cigarette kiosks? Fairy tale castles? Church Icons? Tight corsets? Burkas? In huts with chicken legs? On Magazine covers? In Cabarets? Salem? Porn websites? Next to the heroes? And I would ask out loud, where did they come from Seafoam or Earth? Maybe Clay? “If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense” – a young girl dreamt. Off she went to the wonderland in search of her own self. The title of this exhibition is “A Mad Tea Party”. It is also the name of my old installation and at the same time, it is the title of the video-diptych created especially for this exhibition. Ideally, a ritual of “tea-drinking” is associated with tranquil, organized atmosphere, with etiquette, peace, and self-control – it doesn’t have anything in common with madness. This is why the title of the exhibition absurd. Its absurd word adjustment makes it a separate object of observation of its own – it is an invitation to chaotic syntax. The environment surrounding the tea party in a video is totally absurd as well, where we can see women sitting at the table. This is exactly the nonsense and absurd I consider to be a tool for freedom. Beyond stigmas and dogmas, there is gibberish, and gibberish can be a savor.