{"id":223,"date":"2011-11-11T06:58:28","date_gmt":"2011-11-11T06:58:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/?p=223"},"modified":"2026-03-19T11:18:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T11:18:49","slug":"exhibition-tbilisi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ouritalianfarmhouse.com\/ourstory\/2011\/11\/11\/exhibition-tbilisi\/","title":{"rendered":"Exhibition Tbilisi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The images are intriguing; I\u2019ve seen the posters plastered on buildings and boarded-over windows and the dirty glass of bus shelters.  One shows a young woman in pigtails holding a small bouquet, the other a pair of hands\u2014an old woman\u2019s hands\u2014clasped together perhaps in prayer.  TBILISI, the posters read, Photographs by Vincent Lappartient.  Rustaveli ave 16\/entrance on Besiki str 1.  Free entrance. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s my birthday, the 6th<\/sup> of November, a grey morning, damp and cold with flurries of snow in the biting wind.  Why not, I think, why not check it out?  Rustaveli Avenue is one of the grand, double-wide streets of Tbilisi, so wide that crossing means going underground to re-emerge on the opposite side.  Running into Freedom Square like the spoke of a wheel into its hub, the avenue is easy to find from the Marriott, our temporary quarters.  Finding Besiki Street is a bit tricky but in the end I stumble onto it, led by a paper trail of posters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The photographs are mounted simply, unframed and hanging all around the walls, some high above.  All are images of Tbilisi: its people, buildings, overgrown gardens, churches, laundry lines, trams and buses, the lively and disintegrating city.  A recording of Georgian choral music is playing, its polyphonic harmonies vibrant, thrilling, haunting.  <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

I circle the room until I notice the recording has looped back to its beginning.  I want a catalog, want to take the images with me, but there is only a small booklet for sale, badly printed and with small black and white photographs\u2014a pity.  Finally I tear myself away, but I will return several times, with a friend, with Jim, or alone; I am bewitched.  This is where I begin to fall deeply in love with Tbilisi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weeks later, after the installation has closed, I buy a heavy duty box cutter-cum-scraper.  I prowl the avenues Rustaveli and Chavchavadze in search of the two posters that first drew me into that magical experience.  When I find one in good condition I cut and scrape until it comes away intact; after several tries I have one of each and I take them to the steps of the former Academy of Sciences where in the flea market there I have the pair of posters framed on the spot, for the sum of about $25.  Now I can rest; now I have proof that it all happened, it was not a dream.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The images are intriguing; I\u2019ve seen the posters plastered on buildings and boarded-over windows and the dirty glass of bus shelters.  One shows a young woman in pigtails holding a small bouquet, the other a pair of hands\u2014an old woman\u2019s hands\u2014clasped together perhaps in prayer.  TBILISI, the posters read, Photographs by Vincent Lappartient.  Rustaveli ave
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