Tea Jorjadze Thea Djordjadze ( ka, თეა ჯორჯაძე; born 1971 in

Tbilisi Tbilisi ( ; ka, თბილისი ), in some languages still known by its pre-1936 name Tiflis ( ), is the Capital city, capital and the List of cities and towns in Georgia (country), largest city of Georgia (country), Georgia, lying on the ...

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

) is a contemporary artist based in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. She is best known for

sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

and

installation art Installation art is an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior interventions are often called ...

, but also works in a variety of other media (drawing, painting, printing, performance, video, music).

Career

Tea Jorjadze studied at the

Academy of Arts An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, f ...

in Tbilisi from 1988–1993. Due to the

Georgian Civil War The Georgian Civil War lasted from 1991 to 1993 in the South Caucasian country of Georgia. It consisted of inter-ethnic and international conflicts in the regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, as well as the violent military ''coup d'état'' ...

the school was closed in 1993. Jorjadze left the country and became a student at the

Gerrit Rietveld Academy The Gerrit Rietveld Academie, also known as Rietveld School of Art & Design and Rietveld Academy, is an art academy in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The academy was founded in 1924 and offers programs in fine arts and design. History In 1924, the In ...

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

. After one year she left the Netherlands for the Staatliche Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, where Professor

Dieter Krieg Dieter or dieter may refer to: * A person committed to dieting People Dieter is a German given name (), a short form of Dietrich, from ''theod+ric'' "people ruler", see Theodoric. Given name * Dieter Althaus (born 1958), German politician ...

(until 1997) and Professor

Rosemarie Trockel Rosemarie Trockel (born 13 November 1952) is a German conceptual artist. She has made drawings, paintings, sculptures, videos and installations, and has worked in mixed media. From 1985, she made pictures using knitting-machines. She is a prof ...

(1998–2001) became her teachers. She graduated as ''Meisterschüler'' of Rosemarie Trockel in 2000. In 1996, she went back to Tbilisi to catch up on her bachelor of arts. From 1999 on, Jorjadze was a member of the artist group ''hobbypopMUSEUM'', alongside for example Björn Dahlem, Bettina Furler, Christian Jendreiko, Matthias Lahme, Dietmar Lutz, André Niebur,

Sophie von Hellermann Sophie von Hellermann (born 1975, Munich) is an artist based in London who gained a fine art degree at the Royal College of Art. She went to art school in London, and stayed because "It's magical." She has been inspired by German Romanticism and ...

, and Markus Vater. The group was running a studio in a former postal building in Düsseldorf, which they also used regularly as an exhibition space. The collective released several catalogs as well as records, such as ''Studio Apartment''. hobbypopMUSEUM was invited to participate at shows in San Francisco by

Luc Tuymans Luc Tuymans (born 14 June 1958) is a Belgian visual artist best known for his paintings which explore people's relationship with history and confront their ability to ignore it. World War II is a recurring theme in his work. He is a key figure ...

, then curator of the ''NICC'' in

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

, and by the

Tate Gallery Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the U ...

. In 2003, Djordjadze stopped working with hobbypopMUSEUM (the artist group still exists). Jorjadze collaborated on several occasions with Rosemarie Trockel, including the

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...

in 2003, and exhibitions at Kunsthalle St. Gallen in (2006), the 11th Biennale de Lyon (2007), Sprüth Magers Berlin (2017), and Deichtorhallen Hamburg (2019), among others. Tea Jorjadze is represented by Galerie Monika Sprüth Philomene Magers in Berlin, London and Los Angeles; by Kaufmann Repetto in Milan; and by Galerie Meyer Kainer in Vienna.

Work

Tea Jorjadze works with materials like plaster, wood, ceramic, glass, along with fabrics, sponge, soap, cardboard or papier-mâché – more openly suggestive of a sphere of feminine domesticity. They are assembled in what looks like an almost intuitive process, where unformed, premature pieces collide with / or rest on precise architectural or domestic structures: hybrid compositions with references to the modernist language. In her works and their titles, she refers to popular culture, film (e.g. ''Augen ohne Gesicht'', 2000), architecture (e.g.

le Corbusier Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (6 October 188727 August 1965), known as Le Corbusier ( , , ), was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now regarded as modern architecture. He was ...

in ''Mondi Possibli'' 2006), (popular) science and hermetism (e.g. edition ''Die Mathematik'', 2001, installation ''o.T. (Dipol)'', 2003, or performances ''WahrSagen'', 2001, and ''Kaffeesatzlesen'', 2008), literature (e.g. ''Je n'ai besoin de personne pour me souvenir''

Lilya Brik Lilya Yuryevna Brik (alternatively spelled ''Lili'' or ''Lily''; russian: link=no, Ли́ля Ю́рьевна Брик; née Kagan; – August 4, 1978) was a Russian author and socialite, connected to many leading figures in the Russian avant ...

and

Vladimir Mayakovsky Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky (, ; rus, Влади́мир Влади́мирович Маяко́вский, , vlɐˈdʲimʲɪr vlɐˈdʲimʲɪrəvʲɪtɕ məjɪˈkofskʲɪj, Ru-Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky.ogg, links=y; – 14 Apr ...

or in ''Archäologie, Politik, Politik, Archäologie, Archäologie, Politik, Politik, Archäologie'' Andrè Malraux and

Joseph Brodsky Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky (; russian: link=no, Иосиф Александрович Бродский ; 24 May 1940 – 28 January 1996) was a Russian and American poet and essayist. Born in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg), USSR in 1940, ...

), as well as Georgian arts and crafts and culture (e.g. in incorporating carpets in her work or in quoting Niko Pirosmani in 2001). The viewer is often invited into an ongoing research, in which the transformation and assemblage of materials is sedimented in the objects. ''Der Knacks'' (i.e. the crack) (2007), a plaster sculpture broken and then reassembled in an in-stable formation is emblematic of the artist’s method of production. The title of the work refers to

Francis Scott Fitzgerald Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer. He is best known for his novels depicting the flamboyance and excess of the Jazz Age—a term he popularize ...

’s ''The Crack Up'', in which break or failure is indicated as the center part of the creative process.

Honors and Grants

In 2001, Jorjadze was awarded the ''Reise-Stipendium'' (travel grant) of SK-Stiftung Düsseldorf and ''Peter-Mertes-Stipendium''; in 2004 the ''NRW-Stipendium für Künstlerinnen mit Kindern'' (scholarship for female artists with children of the state NRW) and ''Atelier–Stipendium der Imhoff–Stiftung und des

Köln Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 million ...

ischen Kunstvereins'' (studio grant); in 2006, she was invited by ''Sommerakademie des

Zentrum Paul Klee The Zentrum Paul Klee is a museum dedicated to the artist Paul Klee, located in Bern, Switzerland and designed by the Italian architect Renzo Piano. It features about 40 percent of Paul Klee's entire pictorial oeuvre. In 1997, Livia Klee-Meyer, P ...

'' and in 2007 to an artist residency by

Artist-run space An artist-run space or artist-run centre (Canada) is a gallery or other facility operated or directed by artists, frequently circumventing the structures of public art centers, museums, or commercial galleries and allowing for a more experimental ...

''Studio Voltaire'' London, in 2008 she was granted a ''Arbeitsstipendium'' (work grant) of

Kunststiftung NRW Kunststiftung NRW (''Art Foundation NRW'') is a foundation created by the government of the German state North Rhine-Westphalia. It was established on September 12, 1989, and started operations in the spring of 1990. It is based in Düsseldorf ...

and the ''Katalogstipendium der Alfried-Krupp-von-Bohlen-und-Halbach-Stiftung'' (catalog grant). In 2009, she received the '' Kunstpreis der Böttcherstraße in Bremen''. In March 2019 Kunsthalle Portikus was awarded the Dr. Marschner Stiftung exhibition prize 2018 for Djordjadze's solo sho
''o potio n.''

Other

In 2001 was impersonating

Madonna Madonna Louise Ciccone (; ; born August 16, 1958) is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Widely dubbed the " Queen of Pop", Madonna has been noted for her continual reinvention and versatility in music production, songwriting, a ...

for an

Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin Inez van Lamsweerde (born 25 September 1963) and Vinoodh Matadin (born 29 September 1961) are a Dutch-American Fashion photography, fashion photographer duo, whose work has been featured in fashion magazines and advertising campaigns. They also pr ...

fashion editorial for the March 2002 issue of WDjordjadze as ''Madonna'' on wunderbuzz.co.uk
/ref> Thea Djordjadze's father is the musician Irakli Jorjadze. She is distantly related to film director

Nana Jorjadze Nana Jorjadze ( ka, ნანა ჯორჯაძე; born 24 August 1948) is an Academy Award nominated film director, scriptwriter and actress. Jorjadze was born in Tbilisi, and graduated first from a local musical school (1966), and then from ...

References

External links