Pirosmani

One of several films made in the USSR about art - the most well known ones including Paradjanov's The Colour of Pomegranates and Tarkovsky's Andrei Rublev. Here the focus is on Noko Pirosmanishvilli (1863-1918) a Georgian painter whose work came to be recognised several years after his death.

Shengelaya has made here a film of pure nostalgia having reconstructed the taverns and palaces of Tiflis by photographs and pictures of that period. He follows aspects from the painter's life through the richness of the paintings and the simple beauty of old stones and buildings in the city. The film is a rare case in its success to incorporate the work of an artist into his life experience, identifying ultimately these two ostensibly opposed elements. Pirosmani's own anxieties - his alcoholism and his suppressed desire for a singer - are implicitly stated through his work rather than directly being pointed at. The main virtue of the film, namely its atmosphere and visual splendour, are largely due to Konstantin Apryatin's marvellous photography. The perfectly symmetrical shots of Pirosmani's life and work possess all the formalism which is required to portray life through art, while his naturalistic paintings reveal a variety of richly eathly colours. There are moments of Surrealist explosions such as the one with the artist daydreaming about encountering a black shepherd with a black sheep and a white one, a weird scene enhanced by some strangely beautiful folk music.

The dialogue in the film, as one would expect from the Soviets, is very restrained, but its poeticism, unmatched aesthetics and insight into Pirosmani's mysterious life make it less of a film but rather a fascinating wander inside an art gallery.

Review by Spiros Gangas
Taken from EUFS Programme 1993-94