Irakli Tezelashvili

Thesis (Provisional Title): The Shifting Identities: Art, Ideology and Patronage in Twelfth-century Georgia

Supervised by Professor Antony Eastmond, Advised by Dr Jessica Barker

Funded by the LEPL International Education Center and The Courtauld Postgraduate Scholarship

This thesis undertakes the study of the various identities, ideologies, and patronage in twelfth-century Georgian art. While looking at iconography, material, and contents through the objects of various media – ranging from monumental painting to portative pectorals – the project seeks to tackle a discussion on how/why art could have been manipulated for the manifestation of interests, political influence, and self-fashioning of royalty, aristocracy, and clergy. This study tries to shift the formalistic and nationalistic approaches that dominate Georgian art history to relatively broader notions of social history and political theology while conducting relevant comparisons with the same themes in Byzantium and beyond.

Education

2018–2020 MA Art History (‘Cultural Heritage and Modernity’), Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, The Institute of Art History and Theory (Distinction)

2014–2018 BA Art History (major), Byzantine Studies (minor), Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, The Institute of Art History and Theory (Distinction)

Teaching Experience

Semester 1, 2023/24, The Courtauld, Foundations BA1, Teaching Assistant

Summer 2023, The Courtauld Institute of Art, Teaching Assistant, Summer University

Summer 2022, The Courtauld Institute of Art, Teaching Assistant, Summer University

Professional Activity

December 2020–March 2021, Research Assistant, The University of California, Santa Barbara

May–July 2019, Research Assistant, The Johns Hopkins University

March 2019–September 2021, Research Assistant in The Centre for Georgian Art Studies, The Institute of Art History and Theory at The Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University.

Publications

Books

Dimitri Gordeev, Studies in Medieval Georgian Art, Edited by Zaza Skhirtladze and Irakli Tezelashvili (Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press, Forthcoming).

Materials for the Study of the Murals of the Church of Saint Gregory in Ani. Notes by Nikolai Sichev 1911–1912, Edited by Zaza Skhirtladze, Irakli Tezelashvili, and Nikolai Smirnov (Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press, 2019).

Book Chapters

“Dimitri Gordeev. Materials for Biography and Bibliography. Addenda Bibliographica“, in Dimitri Gordeev, Studies in Medieval Georgian Art, Edited by Zaza Skhirtladze and Irakli Tezelashvili (Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press, Forthcoming), xvii–xxxviii, 500–30.

“Materials for the Study of Murals of Saint Gregory in Ani. Notes by Nikolai Sichev 1911–1912”, in Zaza Skhirtladze ed., Ed., Ani and Georgia, vol. 3 (Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press, 2020), 437–521 [co-authored with Zaza Skhirtladze].

“Materials about the Church of Saint Gregory in Ani from Dimitri Gordeev’s Expeditions”, in Zaza Skhirtladze Ed., Ani and Georgia, vol. 3 (Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press, 2020), 522–33 [co-authored with Zaza Skhirtladze].

Articles

“Materials for the Study of Ancha Icon of Saviour and Tsilkani Icon of the Virgin”, Proceedings of Gelati Academy of Sciences IV (2018): 211–53 (in Georgian) [co-authored with Zaza Skhirtladze]

Projects/Grants

2021 May–November, Medieval Georgian Monumental Painting: A Database [Phase II] (Funded by the Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University) (with Zaza Skhirtladze, Elizabeth Ugulava, Salome Meladze, Tamar Letodiani, Keti Gongadze, and Gia Shervashidze).

2020 November, Friends of Academic Research in Georgia (FaRiG) Caroline Adams Essay Prize for an essay “Intercession Through Dialogue: Depicting the Virgin Paraklesis in Medieval Georgia”.

2020 July–December, Medieval Georgian Monumental Painting: A Database [Phase I] (Funded by the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport of Georgia) (with Zaza Skhirtladze, Elizabeth Ugulava, Salome Meladze, Tamar Letodiani, Keti Gongadze, and Gia Shervashidze).

Conference Presentations and Public Talks (Recent)

7 October 2023, ‘Vested in Privilege: Polystaurion in Byzantium and Beyond,’ Constantinople and Mtskheta: Ecclesiastical and Cultural Interactions, Ecumenical Patriarchate: Halki Theological School, Organised by the Georgian Parish of Constantinople, İstanbul, Türkiye.

2 May 2023, ‘Art and Patronage in Twelfth-Century Georgia: The Icon of Christ from Gelati Monastery,’ The Courtauld Institute of Art, Year 2 Byzantine, Medieval and Renaissance PhD Symposium.

Summer Schools/Workshops

20 June–4 July 2022, Cappadocia in Context Summer Program (CAPP), Koç University Research Center for Anatolian Civilizations (ANAMED), Cappadocia, Nevşehir, Türkiye.