Magic Carpets

In 2021 Tbilisi Photo Festival in partnership with Tbilisi Photography & Multimedia Museum implemented two art residency programs and produced works with support of MagiC Carpets, a Creative Europe Platform.

Artis-in-residence program with Carmen Brucic (Austria)

Carmen Brucic - lives and works in Austria at the interface of art and science. She focuses on themes related to emotional relationships, vulnerability and fragility. Her intimate perspective allows her to reveal important but delicate issues of society. Her artwork emerges from the interplay between the fine arts, theater and photography.

Within two weeks in the summer of 2021 she creates five portraits that circle round the following questions: Can resistance flourish in isolation? Which other forms of resistance can be developed? How does one prepare oneself for the future? How can political and social changes be pushed? Future wide open.

Multimedia project "Private Stages" is about five activists who are part of a universe, part of a revolution that comes to an unexpected halt because of a global pandemic.

The Protagonists are all related to the famous Night Club Bassiani in Georgia’s Capital Tbilisi, where the young and queer community could meet freely und unrestrictedly till a police raid and attacks from far-right groups and religious unions threatened the community and the idea of unity, freedom and social justice.

For days thousands of young Georgians danced and protested in in front of the parliament in spring 2018 to voice their concern about brutality and control. The RAVE REVOLUTION was born. „We dance together, we fight together“ was the battle cry. The Bassiani reopened but after one enemy was defeated, a much stronger opponent appeared: a pandemic that shut down all the clubs. Reopening unforeseeable.

The artist and photographer Carmen Brucic tries to approach the topic by different artistic means. In Tbilisi her challenge is to build a very personal and intimate space where the power of loneliness and concentration can be felt.

 Multimedia project to check | Carmen Brucic - Private Stages

Art Residency Accompanied by a Long-term Mentorship Program & Production Grant for South Caucasian Women Photographers 

7 South Caucasian women photographers and visual artists have been selected for the Year 4 of MagiC Carpets program - Art Residency Accompanied by a Long-term Mentorship Program & Production Grant that wilmentored by Iranian photographer Newsha Tavakolian/Magnum Photos.  

The program supported the South Caucasian women photographers and visual artists to produce stories covering different issues in the region that vary from anxiety to harassment, from pain of losing the loved ones to sexual violence , memory and imagination, isolation and loneliness, connections to the place.

During 6 months the grantees had benefited from an online individual mentorship and the series of lectures by international artists and curators.

 Multimedia project to check | Ana Patladze - Attempts

 Multimedia project to check | Elene Duduchava - Like The Cat, I Have Nine Times To Die

 Multimedia project to check | Mariam Amurvelashvili - Breaking The Day

 Multimedia project to check | Nazik Armenakyan - Red Black White






 Video Art | Hunay Saday - If I Can Not Go There Then I Can Bring It Here





 Experimental film | Merri Mkrtchian - Yerevanian Illness





 Movie/Video Art | Sofia Melikova - We Drink Water From The Same River

Project curator – Elina Valaite.

 


Cover image © Ana Patladze. Attempts. 2021