Publication details
Medieval Art in Georgia through the Soviet Lens: from Colonialist Marginalization to Nationalist Acclamation
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| Year of publication | 2023 |
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| Description | Arising from a cultural crossroads between Europe and Asia and characteristic by profound cultural syncretism, the art and architecture of medieval Georgia has been put on the side-lines of the Eurocentric art historical canon. The marginalization is due in large part to historiographic factors stemming from the past two hundred years of Russian domination of South Caucasus. This lecture investigates the progressive historiographic construction of two main (and sometimes contradictory) perspectives that have shaped the limited understanding that art historians worldwide have of Georgian medieval art. Firstly, we will briefly expose the dominant Russian narrative making the art of South Caucasus the product of a geographically and culturally peripheral zone of assimilation and imitation of Byzantium. This evidently reflected the marginal political position of Georgia within the Russian Empire and Soviet Union. Secondly, we will focus on the establishment of art history as scientific discipline in the 1920’s in Georgia, on its methodological and ideological frameworks, as well as on its fundamental role in the process of formation of ethnic and national identity. |
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