archive user guide
ge

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

Gia Bugadze's exhibition "Olim - Once Upon a Time" [National Gallery]

2018

"Olim" is a Latin word meaning "once upon a time". The word contains two references to time, both past and future. Gia Bugadze's series "Olim - Once Upon a Time" presented at the exhibition is a megalography consisting of 33 independent works, which is aimed at posing one large-scale and relevant idea or problem.

In Europe, and beyond, there is a household tradition - the rule of conduct - when leaving an apartment or house temporarily, items, objects, furniture, mirrors, chandeliers are covered with white material - to protect, protect from damage and dust until they return home.

"Olim is a" theater "of visual memory that aims to revitalize and preserve. That 's why I used this method: I took scenes from Scripture, in particular the Gospels, and rendered them in iconographic versions so that each scene was easily recognizable. "I covered it, wrapped it in a kind of sudara-net, hid it, re-examined it, kept it until the announcement-opening time," says the author.

The "Olim - Once Upon a Time" series covers content-opening when the many ideas that are stored and covered today are opened and explained; this will only happen when it comes time for us to return home.