The work, which was created as an outcome of my research period at the museum, is based on the materials found at the museum – a wooden display box, a book of accounts from 1977, and a sentence in Georgian (I demand a voice) abstracted from an interview with Elene Sepiashvili, a former employee of Tbilisi Silk Weaving Factory. The lightbox displays two layers overexposed on top of each other – a photo of the book of accounts unfolded and a pattern created with a sentence.

During my research at the State Silk Museum in Tbilisi, my attention was drawn to the pile of patterns in the archive with the name ‘Unknown author’. This pile emerged in the process of sorting, analyzing, and tracing the authors (designers, colorists, artists, etc.) behind the patterns preserved on the plates, and placing them under different folders. Next to the vibrant and colorful textile samples produced in the second half of the 20th century, there were piles of hand-bound books of accounting and other documents kept at the museum. One could look at those as pattern books of that time, preserving detailed accounting to the point of absurdity.

What attracted me to work with this archive was its fragmented nature, its fragility towards interpretation, and its visual complacency as a form – sample books, patterns, fragmented narratives, display, design.

‘Unknown author’ struck me as an interesting metaphor representing all the individuals who participated in the Soviet collective production. Just like many other important elements of the Soviet inheritance, they also disappeared without traces.

My intention was to create an object that would offer a space to question the topic of an unknown author. Without information about them, we lose an opportunity to learn and reflect on a specific period in our history, hence, on our own biographies.

Research and production in the framework of the support residency program “Outside the Cocoon: How to Present Art Publicly During the Pandemic?”
Support for this program is provided by the State Silk Museum through a grant from CEC ArtsLink’s Art Prospect program.