Discovering Georgian Cinema: Pirosmani Review

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Pirosmani (1969)

Cast: Avtandil Varazi, Dodo Abashidze, Givi Aleksandria
Director: Giorgi Shengelaia
Country: Soviet Union
Genre: Drama | Biography
Websites: TIFF

Editor’s Notes: The following review is part of our coverage for TIFF’s Discovering Georgian Cinema. For more information on this TIFF film series visit http://tiff.net and follow TIFF on Twitter at @TIFF_NET.

Pirosmani jolts into motion with a haunting score and an ambiguous painting that offers a silently menacing backdrop for the opening credits. A wonderland of deep focus compositions emerges as we track through living paintings that are saturated with color, texture, and culture. We are presented with surreal imagery and disorienting cuts that tell the story of Georgian primitivist painter Niko Pirosmani through a series of tableaux meant to mirror his body of work. Frames are stripped to their basest compositional elements and side characters become part of the visual tapestry as director Giorgi Shengelaia tells Pirosmani’s life story using the artist’s unique perspective of the world.

Pirosmani jolts into motion with a haunting score and an ambiguous painting that offers a silently menacing backdrop for the opening credits.

Untrained artists are often the most essential as they capture their world perspective without the burdens and prejudices of formal training, but strict adherents to the arbitrary rules of art will always refuse to understand or accommodate the art of the uninitiated. Pirosmani was largely rejected by the art world and died penniless and dejected, an all too familiar story for uniquely talented people who are incapable of operating in lock step with the status quo. His painting techniques revealed a soul that perceived the world with an endearing innocence and it is this innocence at the core of his character that allowed him to be taken advantage of by others and never reap the benefits from his unique body of work. Others would sell his art while deeming it to be garbage, but he took these daily heartbreaks in stride, never losing the innocence and earnest uncertainty that made both the man and his art unique.

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Starting out with a modest shop selling farmer’s cheese and milk to passing villagers, Pirosmani showed a strong work ethic and a grounded sense of reality. He pursued this endeavor whole heartedly, using his paintings as functional decor as the shop was more important to him than his art. He reveled in the simple pleasures of life, buying a small patch of grass from a passing farmer so he could lay on it and think of home. Unfortunately the soul of an artist is ill suited for a life in commerce, and his modest business eventually collapses, leaving Pirosmani without the means to support himself. It is better to whither in obscurity than to betray your soul, but living by one’s ideals has never made for an easy life in any society.

It is better to whither in obscurity than to betray your soul, but living by one’s ideals has never made for an easy life in any society.

He would enjoy small moments of validation from his peers, but those moments were stripped away by naysayers and “clever” art critics. His peers would visit him in his crumbling one-bedroom home wedged beneath stone city stairs, heartbroken by the fate of their friend but unable to offer assistance beyond a little money and help securing a commission. Despite the efforts of the few kind hearted people in his life, Pirosmani’s story is heartbreaking and tragic, making for a powerfully affecting film. Pirosmani uses elements of the artist’s style to craft expressive frames with the basest compositional elements. It is a film steeped in culture and each carefully constructed scene casts brush strokes onto the screen, capturing both a culture and the artist through imagery that is simultaneously sparse, elegant, and unforgettable.

8.9 GREAT

Pirosmani uses elements of the artist’s style to craft expressive frames with the basest compositional elements. It is a film steeped in culture and each carefully constructed scene casts brush strokes onto the screen, capturing both a culture and the artist through imagery that is simultaneously sparse, elegant, and unforgettable.

  • 8.9
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About Author

Behind me you see the empty bookshelves that my obsession with film has caused. Film teaches me most of the important concepts of life, such as cynicism, beauty, ugliness, subversion of societal norms, and what it is to be a tortured member of humanity. My passion for the medium is an important part of who I am as I stumble through existence in a desperate and frantic search for objective truths.