Illegal Kosmonavtika

curated by Magda Guruli
and Mariam Natroshvili

Illegal Kosmonavtika (Russian for Cosmonautics) is a quiet protest being made by young artists living and working in Georgia. Their outward target is the various state and corporate entities who currently own the exclusive rights to space research. Illegal Kosmonavtika re-appropriates discarded imagery of the Soviet cosmos with its socially relevant ideals of human purpose in order to pose a very legitimate modern question: what kinds of 'skills' should be cultivated in order to survive if the current systems should collapse? The exhibition, held in a decommissioned building of the Institute of Space Structures, features site-specific works, along with the documentation and outcomes of the workshops held in Tbilisi Geophysical Observatory. In a thematic gesture, the participating artists create logos, outfits, and other visual symbols related to Illegal Kosmonavtika

  • artists:
    Zura Jishkariani
    Mariam Natroshvili and Detu Jincharadze
    Iliko Zautashvili
    Mamuka Japharidze
    Group Bouillon
    Giorgi Maghradze
    Ana and Tamar Chaduneli
Magda Guruli is a Tbilisi-based curator of contemporary art. Since 2008, she has organized Artisterium, an annual International Contemporary Art Exhibition in Tbilisi. Other exhibitions Guruli has curated include: Atmosphere 41 Degree, NCCA, Moscow (2006), Atmosphere 41 Degree, City, parallel exhibition of the 10th Istanbul Biennale, (2007), Journey to Tbilisi, Fine Art Museum of Nantes (2008), and Go East! Next Step, Bialystok, Poland (2010). She has participated in a number of conferences, workshops, and symposiums in Turkey, Ireland, South Korea, Poland, Mexico, Sweden, Italy, Greece, and Germany. She is interested in participatory art and transnational processes in post-totalitarian society.

Mariam Natroshvili is a Tbilisi-based artist and curator. Since 2012, Natroshvili has worked in collaboration with artist and architect Detu Jintcharadze. Working mainly in public and abandoned spaces in her artistic and curatorial projects, she brings art to unexpected places, questioning the possibility of a different future. She is interested in post-soviet mythology, disappearing knowledge, invisible people, forgotten places, and the recreation of vanished memories. In 2016, Natroshvili is curating Fest i Nova 2016: Future Memory in Garikula, Central Georgia. She is also a co-founder and editor of the art newspaper Revolver.




 
apexart’s program supporters past and present include the National Endowment for the Arts, Milton and Sally Avery Arts Foundation, the Kettering Family Foundation, the Buhl Foundation, The Martin and Rebecca Eisenberg Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Spencer Brownstone, the Kenneth A. Cowin Foundation, Epstein Teicher Philanthropies, The Greenwich Collection Ltd., William Talbott Hillman Foundation/Affirmation Arts Fund, the Fifth Floor Foundation, the Consulate General of Israel in New York, The Puffin Foundation, the Trust for Mutual Understanding, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, public funds from Creative Engagement, supported by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Governor and administered by LMCC, funds from NYSCA Electronic Media/Film in Partnership with Wave Farm: Media Arts Assistance Fund, with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, as well as the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature.