Avant-Garde in Georgia. 1900–1936

In the turbulent global context following the fall of the Russian Empire and the October Revolution, Georgia declared its independence in 1918. Between then and the beginning of Soviet rule in 1921, an Avant-Garde creative scene burgeoned. Artists met, mainly in the many taverns and cafés in Kutaisi and the capital Tbilisi, to organize multidisciplinary events. Their frequent collaborations and interactions, which bore the imprint of Georgian tradition and Western and Eastern influences, took various forms: paintings, drawings, films, photos, performances and typographical experiments. Divergent movements such as Symbolism/Neo-Symbolism, Futurism, Dadaism, Zaum, Expressionism, Cubism and Cubo-Futurism existed side by side in unprecedented creative turbulence.