Tsereteli Sr. took part in the Great Patriotic War. For excellent service he was awarded orders, medals and thanks. But because of the wound, he was discharged into the reserve with the rank of colonel. Tsereteli Konstantin Ivanovich after the war took part in the restoration of destroyed objects. At the same time, he taught at the Polytechnic Institute in Tbilisi.
Zurab's mother, Nizharadze Tamara Semyonovna, came from a princely family. She devoted her whole life to raising her children, as is customary in the Caucasus. Zurab grew up in an atmosphere of artistic creativity. His uncle, his mother's brother, Georgy Nizharadze, a well-known painter, constantly took his nephew to his house. Here George introduced the boy Zurab to cultural figures, Georgian artists: David Kakabadze, Sergo Kobuladze, Ucha Japaridze, Apollon Kutateladze, Chiko Kazbegi, Dursun Imnashvili. Communication with such a contingent of people did not go unnoticed for Zurab Tsereteli.
At the lessons at school, young Zurab drew a lot. In many of his works, even then, a sense of belonging to history, to the life of the country, arose. Often during the summer holidays Tsereteli went to Western Georgia to his grandmother, she lived in the village of Gubi. Here the future artist saw folk culture, the beauty of household items, the diversity of nature. Only in Gubi Zurab felt free without the bustle of the city. He was struck by the variety of colors that could not be seen in Tbilisi. All this formed the foundation of creativity for the artist.
In his free time, Zurab Tsereteli visited museums, where he studied the exhibits presented. He traveled a lot, learned new things, rode horses a lot, walked a lot. Tsereteli, in order to get to know nature better, listened to the murmur of mountain rivers, memorized the smell of the earth. Thus, Tsereteli bypassed the places that attracted artists: Kakheti, Imereti, Tusheti, Svaneti, Racha, Khevsureti, Abkhazia, Adzharia, Guria.
All this played an important role in the development of Zurab Konstantinovich as an artist. In 1958 the artist graduated from the Academy of Arts. His graduation work was "The Song of Tbilisi". But she was not admitted to the defense due to “elements of conventionality”. Tsereteli had to change the theme of the diploma, and in a couple of weeks he painted a new painting, Portrait of an Athlete. The work was highly appreciated.
In the 60s, Zurab Tsereteli quickly took a position in Soviet art. Once architect Shota Kalandarishvili gave Zurab the task to paint a children's cinema in Tbilisi. The artist felt the childish fantasy, where there are fairy tales, fiction, but the painting was not done in kind.
Zurab Tsereteli Art Gallery
Zurab was interested in architects who worked on the creation of a large resort complex in Pitsunda. It was Tsereteli who was invited as the chief artist of this unique object. In this work, he appeared as a muralist. All Zurab Tsereteli in Pitsunda became a new step in the development of monumental art in Russia.
This was followed by large mosaic works by the artist Tsereteli in many regions of Georgia. A famous work was the mosaic panel "Man, labor - the meaning and beauty of being", located on the facade of the Palace of Culture of Trade Unions. After that, the decoration of the restaurant in Tbilisi "Aragvi" appeared. This work was awarded the State Prize. Zurab Tsereteli took part in the design of the Borjomi resort. In the 70s, the sculptor participated in the creation of the Victory Park in Tbilisi, his work “Banners” is hung in the park on a lined wall. Zurab Konstantinovich also worked in Adler on a monumental complex. The artist applied a new technique of working on metal. He developed techniques to create large reliefs. Tsereteli painted a relief on sheet copper, then knocked it out, and then cut out all the figures and pushed them forward. The relief was large and well perceived from a great distance.
Zurab Tsereteli and his work
Works were made using the new technology: the monument in Abashi, the composition "Colchis", "Man and the Sun", "Ties of Friendship". Zurab Tsereteli took part in the creation of the Izmailovo hotel complex in Moscow. The sculptor is widely known abroad. He was personally acquainted with Marc Chagall, Pablo Picasso, David Siqueiros, met with Robert Rauschenberg, Kenzo Tange and many other famous artists and architects of the 20th century. Politicians and cultural figures who came from around the world visited his workshops and continue to visit them. Tsereteli worked in different countries of the world. He designed the interior of the USSR Mission to the UN in New York. A huge stainless steel panel “Moscow, the Capital, My Moscow” adorns the Embassy Hall in Tokyo. In the USA, the success of Tsereteli's work was enormous. The creator worked as a teacher at the Faculty of Arts. For teaching work Tsereteli Tsereteli in Moscow created monumental works.
He took part in the restoration of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. According to the representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, Zurab Tsereteli brilliantly fulfilled all the tasks set before him, and the appearance of the elements of the artistic decoration of the church that he recreated corresponds to the old ones.
Any work of art inevitably bears the imprint of the time in which it is created.
Lado Gudiashvili wrote: “I am firmly convinced of one thing - art cannot exist outside of a specific time. No matter how large the work is, no matter how high its tower is, the foundation and first floors are strong, it must remain in the time in which it is created. Nothing else is given, and therefore art is eternal. Its forms, the thoughts that it carries, are only an expression of the being of time, its inalienable features.
Subsequently, the images of the works of each era will constitute the cultural heritage of society, but first they will turn into a symbol of their time, influencing the consciousness of contemporaries, preserving and replenishing their historical memory.
The monumental art of Zurab Tsereteli is no exception. The master creates memorials and monuments, sculptural groups and compositions dedicated to the victims of the tragic events of our time - wars, terrorism, outstanding contemporaries - figures of art, culture and science, historical figures and facts that are of the greatest interest to our time. After all, historical memory is not the history of mankind that has gone forever into the past, events and people that have not disappeared into non-existence, but something that is constantly present and acts in our life, on a subconscious level.
From this point of view, his sculptural work can be divided into two parts - portrait sculpture and works born of eternal themes for mankind. This study is devoted to portrait images created by Tsereteli, which can be thematically combined according to the following positions: history of Russian statehood, images of saints and the gallery "My Contemporaries".
At the heart of their common foundation are questions of morality and morality. The portrait images created by the sculptor are united by the increased attention of society to the destinies and characters of specific individuals.
1. History of Russian statehood in portraits
The sculptural series of works by Zurab Tsereteli, dedicated to the history of Russia in the person of its rulers of the 9th-20th centuries, has a special place. The series is made in the form of bronze busts and portrait statues. The culminating point of the artist's close attention to the history of Georgia and Russia - his two native sides, as mentioned earlier, almost coincided with an incredible surge of interest in national history. "Almost", because Tsereteli, true only to his own worldview, did not expect this wave. Since the 1980s, he has been gradually creating first the plastic suite "Rulers of Russia" in the form of german busts, and then full-scale portrait images and sculptural compositions dedicated to representatives of the Romanov dynasty, whose 400th anniversary was celebrated in 2013. The sculptor himself speaks of this work as follows: “I had a need to speak out. For almost thirty years I have been making the sculptural series "Rulers of Russia" and "History of Georgia". And now I'm done. It is not so easy. This is the professional cry that I experienced ... "
Today we see how the spirit of our era was reflected in these plastic chronicles, how they sounded a topic that has been seriously worrying society all these years - the return of the historical memory of the nation, the return to its origins.
The composition consists of two bronze figures: the young emperor and his mother, placed on high round podiums. Little Peter runs recklessly along the cobbled pavement with a sword in his hand, half-turned looking back at Tsarina Natalya, nee Naryshkina, marching behind him. The son, as if persistently calling her after him, urging her to join him. The emperor is depicted as a boy, but his whole figure expresses an unbridled desire to move forward. His energetic run is conveyed so vividly that it seems that the hero may stumble from the podium on which his figure is installed. The pressure and energy in Peter's movement is emphasized by the sharp contrast between the dynamics of his figure and the static figure of his mother. Her image is likened to the image of Russia at the end of the 17th century - a huge clumsy empire, which Peter will be destined to lead.
Tsereteli interprets the figure of Natalia Naryshkina as a fairy-tale noblewoman, absolutely closed from prying eyes. He places the figure of the queen strictly frontally and dresses her in a long, in the fashion of the 17th century, “deaf” dress, ornamented with a rich pattern, covers her from above with an equally richly ornamented sleeveless cape, tied with a buckle on her chest, and wraps her headdress with a shawl. The statue of the queen looks like a silent work of art, indifferent to what is happening around. You can hardly move in such clothes, and it stands like a frozen cocoon of a strange butterfly. You just need to wake her up, shake her up so that she shows herself in all her glory. In fact, the sculptor created an allegory of patriarchal Rus' - beautiful, rich, incomprehensible to the neighbors, frozen in a drowsy hibernation. It won't be long before Peter wakes her up. Deep comprehension of historical events helped the author to achieve a high artistic generalization of the image. All the details of the sculptural composition "Childhood of Peter" are carefully worked out. The expressive appearance of the future emperor, facial expressions, gestures, costume details, as well as the amazing image of his mother, personifying the homeland of the future reformer, are modeled.
Speaking about the sculptural series "Rulers of Russia", one cannot fail to mention the monument "The Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Grand Duchess Olga, patroness of Pskov" - one of the three monuments on the theme of Russian statehood, installed in Russia in a real urban environment. The monument was erected in 2003 for the 1100th anniversary of Pskov. The name of Grand Duchess Olga, who is revered in Pskov as its founder, is associated with the first mention of the city in the annals in 903. Due to circumstances, having risen at the head of a huge, still emerging state, the princess went down in history as the great creator of the state life and culture of Kievan Rus. It was Olga who had the honor to make a choice that determined the subsequent fate of Russia - she was the first of the Rurik dynasty to accept Christianity. Subsequently, the Grand Duchess was canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church as a saint as equal to the apostles.
The monument is characterized by conciseness and restraint. In the plastic solution of the image, the holy sculptor expressed the majestic image of a woman with an unbending will and high self-esteem, invincible courage and a truly state mind, imprinted in the national memory. The figure is solved strictly and monumentally. While retaining real features, the image of Olga is emphatically conditional - she stands, holding a sword in one hand, and leans on a shield with the other. The figure is set on a high granite pedestal with a wide multi-stage base, which, on the one hand, ensures the monument's scale proportions, and, on the other hand, creates a visual support for those moral values that the image of the Grand Duchess embodies.
Taking a look at the portrait gallery of the rulers of Russia, created by Zurab Tsereteli, in the semantic aspect, a parallel arises with the monument “Millennium of Russia” by M.O. Mikeshin in Veliky Novgorod. Mikeshin's monument was intended to "evangelize the descendants of the heroic past of Russia" over the past millennium. In our case, the sculptor limited himself to images of the rulers of the country, demonstrating his desire to acquaint his contemporaries with those whose deeds and destinies in different historical eras were not always evaluated objectively, sometimes hushed up or distorted, but decided the fate of the motherland.
2. Images of saints - a story about lost moral values
The issue of preserving moral values is one of those that concern many today. At one time, Mikhail Anikushin, reflecting on the work of the sculptor, noted: “There are eternal human values, there are noble traditions – we must constantly remind people of them. Only in this way will art bring up citizenship and high spirituality.. A similar approach to creativity is also characteristic of Zurab Tsereteli. As if echoing the aesthetics of classicism, the master creates works imbued with a high moral ideal that improves a person, educates him in civil virtues, devotion to his homeland. After all, in the end, the main task of the artist is to see what others could not see, and to tell about it so that others would pay attention to it.
From this point of view, two monuments by Zurab Tsereteli, erected in the village of Borisoglebsk, Yaroslavl Region, are of interest. We are talking about the monuments to two monks of the Borisoglebsk Monastery - St. Alexander Peresvet and St. Irinarch the Recluse. The first monument, erected in 2005, was created by the sculptor in honor of the 625th anniversary of the Battle of Kulikovo. Alexander Peresvet is a legendary warrior monk who received the blessing of St. Sergius of Radonezh himself to participate in the Battle of Kulikovo together with the soldiers of Demetrius Donskoy and fell in single combat with the Tatar hero Chelubey. The Russian Orthodox Church canonized the monk Peresvet as a saint. The second monument, erected a year later, in 2006, is dedicated to Irinarkh the Recluse, a monk of the Borisoglebsky Monastery, who blessed citizen K. Minin and Prince D. Pozharsky to lead the people's militia for the liberation of Moscow in 1612. In Borisoglebsk, the name of St. Irinarch has been revered for a long time. At the age of 30, he took monastic vows at the Borisoglebsk monastery, and the relics of the saint later rested here.
These two monuments can be called paired. As strange as it may seem for the creative method of Zurab Tsereteli, in this case the sculptures are united by the similarity of the plastic solution - the figures of saints in monastic attire are given in full growth, frontally to the viewer. Alexander Peresvet holds a spear in one hand, and a cross in the other, as if conveying the blessing of St. Sergius of Radonezh to the living, for whom he himself laid down his head on the battlefield. Saint Irinarch is depicted with a covered head - a distinctive element of the attire of a hermit monk, his right hand is raised for blessing. Each monument has a height of 3.2 meters, including the granite pedestal on which it is erected. In the plastic interpretation of the images of the saints, the author's predilection for the play of chiaroscuro created by deep folds of clothing, which enlivens the poses of the figures, giving them dynamics, was manifested. But the main thing that unites these monuments is the idea. Both of them are dedicated to two important events in Russian history for the preservation of Russian statehood - the battle with the Tatar-Mongol army of Mamai in 1380 on the Kulikovo field and the liberation of Moscow from the Polish-Lithuanian invaders by the forces of the people's militia in 1612. “I really want people to love their story” , - says Tsereteli. In any case, thanks to such monuments, we at least remember the history of our country.
The preservation of historical memory is only one side of the tireless activity of the "silent preacher", in the words of Metropolitan Filaret (Drozdov). The second, no less important, is a conversation with the viewer about the heights of the human spirit through the images of ascetics, whose distinctive characteristics are high moral qualities, civic prowess, true, and not leavened patriotism.
In the modern era of the absence of authorities, those who are commonly called the "conscience of the nation", the images of the saints turned out to be almost the only role models that are not subject to devaluation. Therefore, the images of those who have long been called ascetics naturally and logically entered the work of Tsereteli. Two monuments to one of the most revered saints in Rus' - St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, the work of the sculptor, were installed in the Italian city of Bari, 2003, and in the village of Haapsala, Vyborgsky District, 2002. A monument to the holy Prince Oleg of Ryazan was built in Ryazan, 2007. Monumental portraits of two patriarchs - His Holiness the Patriarch of All Rus' Alexy II and His Holiness and Beatitude Catholicos-Patriarch of All Georgia Ilia II in 2009 decorated the courtyard of the Museum of Contemporary Art of the Russian Academy of Arts on Gogol Boulevard.
The monuments to Equal-to-the-Apostles Nina, George the Victorious and Grand Duchess Olga were mentioned above. In the summer of 2013, in the Greek city of Veria, where the Apostle Paul preached, a monument to the saint was unveiled. The sculpture, representing the figure of the apostle, thinned by labors and fasts, with bare feet, but with the gaze of a convinced righteous man, pressing the Holy Scripture with both hands to his chest, does not leave anyone indifferent. The contrast between the inspired face of a person who is confident in the grace-filled power of the teaching he preaches, and a frail barefoot body dressed in a loose chiton creates an emotional tension that makes the viewer stop. Deliberate simplicity in interpreting the image of one of the greatest missionaries of Christianity only brings the viewer closer to him. Attention is drawn to the Eternal Book, pressed to the chest. In the images of the saints, the sculptor sees examples of spiritual greatness and, feeling the demand of the time, tells the viewer about them. At the same time, the author's imagination, knowledge, as far as possible, of the life stories of saints allowed him to create the illusion of a close acquaintance with the characters depicted.
As M.A. Chegodaeva writes, “special attention should be paid to the fact that Tsereteli’s own religious works do not differ stylistically or plastically from his “secular” works, they form a single artistic whole with them.”
One of the recent works of the sculptor, in which he refers to the image of saints, is the monument to Pope John Paul II, which was opened in Paris in October 2014. Our contemporary, repeatedly glorified by his deeds of kindness and charity, his incredible modesty, peace initiatives, Pope John Paul II was canonized by the Catholic Church. Strange as it may seem, the author of the first monument to Pope John Paul II in France was not a Catholic, but an Orthodox one: the monument by Tsereteli was opened in Ploermel in 2006.
“After the opening of the monument in Ploermel,” says the sculptor, “the representatives of the Polish Catholic Church in France asked me to create a monument to John Paul II for installation in Paris. The statue of John Paul II is installed in the courtyard of Notre Dame Cathedral. The figure rises on a granite base, the total height of the monument is 3.2 meters. Not a single monument has ever been erected in this sacred place for the French. This is a great honor for me. The monument was given as a gift from the Russian people, as evidenced by the inscription on the base of the monument.”
The concepts of morality, duty, dignity occupy a special, honorable place in the system of Zurab Tsereteli's worldview. And this feature is one of those that allow us to speak not only about the historicism of the artist's thinking, but about monumental historicism. Considering a person's life from the position of eternity, the master clearly highlights the most important and significant for his prosperous existence on earth - the preservation of spirituality, adherence to centuries-old moral values. Therefore, in an effort to make his own thoughts more understandable for the viewer, the sculptor in his work goes from a portrait image to a symbolic one. In this case, the plastic metaphor of the designated theme is the monument "Russian Truth", established in 2001 in the city of Kogalym of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug. The sculptural composition is formed by a pillar of uvrazhes. The name is clearly engraved on the spine of each: “Great Menaion”, “The Life of St. Sergius of Radonezh” and “The Life of Alexander Nevsky”, “The Tale of Peter and Fevronia of Murom”, “Chronograph”, “The Legend of the Battle of the Novgorodians with the Suzdalians”, Nikonovskaya and the Trinity Chronicle, "The Tale of the Battle of Mamaev", "Zadonshchina", "The Tale of Igor's Campaign" ... At one time, each of these books personified a milestone in Russian history, but today only a narrow circle of specialists is familiar with most of them. And although these works are devoted to historical events, according to Z.K. Tsereteli, they serve not only as a source of information about what happened centuries ago. Over time, they were transformed into a handwritten set of moral postulates that helped the Russian people maintain state independence and build a great power.
Having created a metaphorical image of eternal categories, the master encourages his contemporaries to learn from the example of great ancestors, including among them the wise rulers who gathered Russia bit by bit - specific principalities and then stood not for life, but for death for its unity; heroes who laid down their lives on the Kulikovo field against the hordes of Mamai; brave and courageous Novgorodians, who more than once repulsed the attacks of the Suzdalians, who sought to subjugate the independent Veliky Novgorod. Among the examples of high morality and spirituality of the country, the artist includes all the saints, whose lives are transmitted from century to century by the “Cheti-Minei”, and first of all, Sergius of Radonezh and Alexander Nevsky, the most revered among the people. Let us repeat: the absence of the ideal of a highly moral contemporary, capable of uniting his fellow citizens, is a serious problem for Russia today. The artist feels this most keenly.
In search of metaphorical images of eternal values and high moral principles, Zurab Tsereteli continues to turn to the past and creates another monumental composition dedicated to loyalty, duty, and love. In other words, the most important value orientations of a person at all times, but representing a serious deficit today. We are talking about the sculptural work "Wives of the Decembrists. Gates of Destiny "(2008, Museum of Contemporary Art of the Russian Academy of Arts). A dozen female figures, some with children, stand in front of a tightly locked massive door with a tiny barred window. The heroine in the center of the composition, who is closest to the cherished door, holds in her hands the icon of the Mother of God with the Child. On the faces of graceful young women in beautiful dresses there is humility, betrothed to the determination not to leave their beloved husbands, no matter what it costs them, despite the conditions of life of convicts, the harsh climate, etc. This is a monument to women's sacrifice, the determination to drastically change their fate for the sake of those you love. While the "gates of fate" are not thrown open, the heroines have the opportunity to change their minds, return from distant and cold Siberia to familiar Petersburg, but it seems that there are no cowards among them .
3. Gallery "My Contemporaries" - a plastic symphony about the height and strength of the human spirit
For Zurab Tsereteli, there are landmarks in today's life, presented by him in the form of images that are significant for their time, representatives of art - writers and poets, musicians, dancers and singers, actors and directors, artists ... Sculpture cycle with the traditional name "My contemporaries ”was started in 2000 and continues to grow today, currently numbering almost fifty sculptures in bronze. Some of them are large high reliefs, some are full-scale portrait sculptures, including compositions with the inclusion of monumental details made using the enamel technique. Paolo Trubetskoy, the creator of one of the strongest emotional impacts in Russian art, the monument to Emperor Alexander III in St. Petersburg, said: “There can be no monument without a portrait, and a work of art without a symbol.” This statement is echoed by the portrait gallery "My contemporaries" in the interpretation of Zurab Tsereteli.
M.A. Burganova writes in her monograph on the monumental sculpture of Russia in the 20th century: “In the 1970-1980s, both in easel and monumental sculpture, one of the leading genres was the portrait of a creative person. The life of a writer, poet, artist, musician is comprehended as a phenomenon on a scale with history and even as a fact of history itself. In the years 1990-2000, this trend not only continues, but also intensifies, due to the lifting of bans on the names of many artists who are not loyal to the Soviet regime, and attracting increased public attention to them. Zurab Tsereteli did not stand aside, starting to create the plastic cycle "My Contemporaries". A few words about who is included in the circle of those portrayed. The cycle opens with high relief portraits of poets and writers of the Silver Age - A. Akhmatova, M. Tsvetaeva, A. Blok, O. Mandelstam, I. Bunin...
This fact alone suggests that the sculptor's concept from the very beginning involved the creation of a portrait gallery of famous artists, not only from the images of personal acquaintances and living directly at the same time as the author, but much wider - a gallery of figures symbolizing Russian culture of the 20th century. The sphere in which Russia, perhaps, has made the greatest contribution to the global pantry of civilization. With its representatives, who lived and worked throughout one century of Russian history, the sculptor connects his deep reflections on the fate of modern Russia, on the live roll call of such different times within the same 20th century, on moral problems, in particular, on the problem of the individual's duty to his country. M. Anikushin had no doubts, repeating after V. Mukhina: "In the future, our era will be judged by contemporary works, and we have no right to forget about it." Tsereteli, himself a representative of the era, could not allow the merciless time to erase the names of outstanding personalities, his contemporaries in the 20th century, from the memory of the rapidly changing world. The sculptor himself admits: “I try to expand the My Contemporaries series as much as possible, preserving the impression of those I knew personally. The image of a great man, his inner state for the artist is very important ... "
The synthesizing principle characteristic of the master's work was clearly manifested in the construction of high relief images. Here the sculptor combines the portrait image of the model with the symbol, uses the attributes associated with her professional activities, actively uses the plastic possibilities of the high relief background, up to changing the texture of its surface, which also turns this background into a symbol. The author often combines this technique with elements of lethrism (which is also typical for his monuments in the urban environment) and includes fragments of specific literary works, sometimes - statements of heroes in the background of high relief. These texts play a big role in the perception of the image, instantly reminding the viewer of the work and even the fate of the model. The category of fate in the context of considering the characters chosen by the sculptor is extremely important. This also applies to the representatives of the Silver Age, and to the author's immediate contemporaries - A. Voznesensky, R. Nuriyev, M. Plisetskaya, E. Svetlanov ... These people with world fame and glory had to endure a lot for the right to find, defend and preserve their individuality as artist and as a person. In our opinion, Zurab Tsereteli is talking about this, first of all, about loyalty to his talent despite the circumstances, about the spiritual stamina and moral courage of brilliant people.
At the same time, each portrait of the cycle is perceived as a generalization of the distinctive features, moral and social content of the time to which the hero belongs. The sculptor awakens the historical memory of the viewer, making him think about the reason for choosing this or that character for his work, although he was simply friends or friends with many of them. After all, the stories of the life and work of Tsereteli's heroes, and hence their portraits, contain a real lesson for the present. The sculptor addresses such representatives of the 20th century, whose life experience can tell a lot to a person today, answering his innermost questions and spiritual searches. At the same time, the cycle “My Contemporaries” can also be considered as the author’s confession – a frank story about how the master imagines the fate of the artist, what he thinks about his ability to sacrifice himself in the name of talent, about the ability to maintain devotion to his vocation without losing his creative "I". The general feeling of all the works of the cycle can be described in one word - inspiration. It is the inspiration that comes from the thoughtfully sad S. Yesenin, the wise E. Svetlanov, the indulgent Y. Lyubimov, the artistically calm A. Voznesensky, the ironic O. Tabakov, the excited A. Blok ... So the cycle “My Contemporaries” is read by the viewer as Tsereteli’s plastic poem about inspiration, while at the same time evoking pride in belonging to a nation that has given the world a constellation of celebrities who have enriched world culture in various fields.
Tsereteli himself belongs to the stellar generation of creative people who entered the domestic art scene in the 1960s, and therefore includes his bas-relief self-portrait in the My Contemporaries series. Thanks to this, the works included in the series are made up not only of the sculptor's historical knowledge, but also of involvement in the era, primarily in its culture and art. Expanding the circle of those depicted to representatives of Russian culture of the early 20th century, Zurab Tsereteli proclaims the continuity of Russian art throughout the past century up to the present, declaring, among other things, himself the successor of this greatest cultural heritage. The viewer is presented with an image of the era, characterized by authenticity and historical accuracy. I would like to emphasize that the sculptor turned to the images of representatives of all types of art - visual, musical, literature, architecture, theater and cinema ... which says a lot about the interests of the author, about the nourishing sources of his work.
It is worth emphasizing that the sculptural poem “My Contemporaries” is a portrait one, many of the models, according to the author, posed for him, for example, Voznesensky, Bashmet, Dementiev, Spivakov, Aitmatov, Volchek ... From someone, before starting to sculpt, the sculptor made sketches during performances, as, for example, from Rostropovich, Solzhenitsyn ... and then these sessions were not sessions in the usual sense of the word. So, in addition to the concert performances of M. Rostropovich, Zurab Tsereteli made sketches from the musician during UNESCO meetings, which were attended by both the model and the artist in the rank of Goodwill Ambassadors of this organization. An excellent visual memory also came to the rescue: the sculptor still gratefully recalls Joseph Charlemagne, one of his teachers at the Academy of Arts in Tbilisi, who taught students to draw from memory. Of course, iconographic materials also had to be used.
When asked whose portraits were the most difficult to create, the artist replies: “It was difficult to create almost all the portraits. I wanted to convey the inner state of these people - I do not like to redraw. I create portraits of those whose work is consonant with me and whom I love. For example, my close friends - Voznesensky, Yevtushenko, Aitmatov, Dementiev ... I can express my attitude towards them only through art, so I created their images.
In each sculptural portrait, the viewer sees, first of all, a portrait resemblance to the person being portrayed. In addition, the author necessarily includes in the image individual details that are characteristic only for a particular model, which make the portrait brighter and deeper. At the same time, the sculptor leaves space for the viewer to participate in the perception of the image. This dialogue is always different - depending on the degree of "savvy" of the viewer, but it is always present. M.A. Chegodaeva draws attention to the features of the realism of the sculptures of Zurab Tsereteli: “Just as if they were alive, they are devoid of any traces of naturalism - they are not present either in the sculptural image of the Apostle Paul, or in the monuments to the Pope and the Patriarch, as they are not in the sculptural portraits of artists, writers, politicians. Their “naturalness” is a kind of “superrealism”, what in the 1920s Tairov, Voloshin, Zamyatin called “neorealism”, “mystical”, “fantastic” realism. The heroes of Zurab Tsereteli, both living and departed - some recently, some centuries ago, are in some kind of imperishable temporal space; they are immortal, resurrected by the power of art.”
Speaking about the plastic means of creating an image in the portrait cycle, it is interesting to note the following detail. One of the elements of the high relief is sometimes the image of the sculptor's hometown - Tbilisi. So, this technique is used in high reliefs dedicated to the poets of the late 20th century - B. Akhmadulina and B. Okudzhava. In the first case, for the poet, who has repeatedly sung the beauty of Tbilisi, the pedestal is formed by a column, almost immersed in a relief made up of typical Georgian houses piled on top of each other. In the second, a series of houses descends like an avalanche along a steep mountain range, surrounding the poet, who was born in Tbilisi. This technique used by the sculptor reflects the long-standing close relationship between the literary circles of Georgia and Russia. Remembering Tbilisi in the 1920s (then Tiflis), L. Gudiashvili wrote: “Tbilisi is a city with great poetic traditions. True, poetic cafes have largely lost their former flavor, but still life here was interesting and intense. Disputes, evenings, meetings continued, in which both Georgian and Russian writers took part. After all, many Russian poets received their first baptism in Tbilisi and now they were drawn here like a magnet. .
The names of S. Yesenin, V. Mayakovsky, O. Mandelstam, K. Balmont, B. Pasternak, N. Zabolotsky, N. Tikhonov and other Russian poets turned out to be forever associated with Tbilisi, with Georgia, in which they found new sources of inspiration, and the next generation of writers preserved this tradition. And Zurab Tsereteli, who repeatedly glorified his beloved city in his art, could not help but turn to his image even in the portrait cycle, when appropriate. Such a plastic variety, undoubtedly, expands the possibilities of representing the person being portrayed and activates the historical memory of the viewer.
Some of the high reliefs mentioned above served as the basis for the birth of the portrait statues of the My Contemporaries cycle. So, the images of V. Vysotsky, I. Brodsky, R. Nureyev, M. Tsvetaeva were first created in high relief, and then reworked on an enlarged scale, turning into monumental sculptures in the full sense of the word, which the viewer has the opportunity to bypass and examine from all sides. . Some of them are installed in a real environment: the monument to M. Tsvetaeva now adorns the esplanade of the French town of Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie (2012), the monument to V. Vysotsky was built in the city of Pokachi of the Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug (2012). Other statues included in the cycle were created as independent works. These are the statues of M. Rostropovich, O. Tabakov, N. Mikhalkov, V. Gergiev, A. Solzhenitsyn.
As already noted, the sculptor makes extensive use of attributes and symbols in the portrait gallery that enhance the psychological characteristics of the person being portrayed and refer the viewer either to the work of the model or to her fate. According to A. Zolotov, this is due to the peculiarities of the perception of the model by the artist: “The poetry of perception of reality inherent in the works of Zurab Tsereteli and himself as an artist directs the chosen object of the image towards the symbol and can “take” him out of the sphere of artistic admiration into another sphere – the psychologically convincing “recognition” of the human essence of the hero.”
Much has been written, for example, about the monument to V. Vysotsky: a poet with a guitar, which he never parted with in his life, behind whose back images of golden-domed temples and horses from the most popular songs of the artist “peep out”. Or about the monument to I. Brodsky, half of whose figure the sculptor presented in the clothes of a convict, and the second - in the clothes of a Nobel laureate. What is the high relief dedicated to Vladimir Spivakov, who appears with a "butterfly" on a naked torso with muscular arms and an incredibly inspired face, and the work itself is perceived as a hymn to the musician's "hard labor" labor! The author comments on the portrait of V. Spivakov as follows: “This is a unique musician. He's into sports! The people should know about it. Therefore, I made a portrait of him with a naked torso, but with a “butterfly” as a sign of belonging to the artistic world.” Such capacious details-characteristics say unimaginably much to anyone who is familiar with the life history of these outstanding personalities.
The monument to A. Solzhenitsyn is special, not like the others. It does not contain attributes associated with his activities as a writer, or a human rights activist, or a historian. It lacks metaphors and allegories that suggest the viewer to some parallels and associations with the life and work of this unique person. This monument itself is a symbol - a symbol of eternal pain for the native country. This is exactly how, in our opinion, Zurab Tsereteli understood and conveyed the life of Alexander Isaevich by means of plastic arts, raising the image of a real person to the meaning of a symbol.
At the end of his "Autobiography", presented at the request of the Nobel Committee in 1970, A. Solzhenitsyn wrote: “Even the events that have already happened to us, we almost never can evaluate and realize immediately, in their wake, the more unpredictable and surprising is the course of future events for us.” These words, first of all, refer to Alexander Solzhenitsyn himself, to what his appearance in Russian philosophy, history, literature, morality means for our country, and simply to his appearance as a courageous and whole person. In the sculptural portrait by Zurab Tsereteli, A. Solzhenitsyn is depicted in a burial shroud. His earthly life hung in the balance from death too many times, he repeatedly became a victim of various circumstances, including History itself. A long shirt with a blind collar, falling from the shoulders, creates an image of the greatest humility, concentration and silence with colossal internal tension - the life of the spirit, as if "matter and body did not remind of themselves." Hands play a big role in the portrait. As the sculptor says, “I tried very hard to capture his character – how he spoke with his hands. Each person of art has some special detail ... inherent only to him alone.
Solzhenitsyn's almost joined, but never closed, fingers exacerbate the feeling of intense inner work, a deep wrinkle on his forehead is a sign of enduring pain for his homeland.
"This is the figure of the Artist - the artist-preacher, the artist-thinker, the artist of the spiritual warehouse"
. The feeling that this great man continues to root for the fate of the country even beyond the line of life and death... The statue is filled with the deepest inner content, it clearly shows the sculptor's emotional approach to the fate of the model.
In an effort to create the most detailed portrait of the hero - not only his inner essence, the life of his soul, but also characterizing his creative activity, especially when it comes to brothers in the professional workshop, the sculptor freely experiments in the field of the latest techniques and technologies, saturating the synthesizing method with new elements. of your creativity. The interest of the master in the technique of enamel, in which Tsereteli has been working since the late 1970s, is well known, and the search in the field of which he develops in the following areas: an increase in the number of color tones, the combination of jewelry art of enamel with a monumental form, the transition from flatness to volumetric-spatial structures and the exit enamel work into a real environment.
It is symbolic that for the first time the sculptor included monumental paintings in the technique of cloisonne enamel in the sculptural compositions dedicated to the avant-garde artists of the 20th century - Kazimir Malevich (2013) and Wassily Kandinsky (2013). In both of them, fragments of the iconic works of these legendary artists are executed in the enamel technique. The presence of enamel monumental parts in the composition of bronze emphasizes the artistic individuality of the author, the breadth of his creative aspirations. In fact, the master combined a portrait image and a decorative principle, which is of great importance in monumental plastic arts, at the same time turning these works into symbols due to the generalizing power contained in them.
Summing up the consideration of three extensive plastic cycles by Zurab Tsereteli - the history of Russian statehood, the images of saints and the gallery "My Contemporaries", it can be argued that the sculptor's response to the demands of modern society lies at the origins of their creation. They reflected the atmosphere of the current critical time in the country, which is characterized by people's great interest in their historical past, increased attention to traditions, for known reasons, interrupted for decades, a moral crisis, and a lack of authority among contemporaries capable of uniting disunited and disappointed people. In his Notes on Art, one of the brightest sculptors of his time, Ivan Shadr, wrote that "The most important thing for an artist is to reflect the spiritual essence of the era."
Years later, in continuation of this thought, the sculptor Mikhail Anikushin emphasized: “Art always requires experience, reflection; superficial topicality does not give a true image of today. Fine art is “photo fixation”, it is akin to philosophy, its area is not fluent handicrafts, but a realistic picture, an image of Time”. Zurab Tsereteli was able to clearly capture the mood of modernity at the turn of two centuries and, according to his worldview, provided answers to questions that worry society, creating a plastic image of his era.
The biography of Zurab Tsereteli is monumental just like his work. The list of works of this outstanding artist includes hundreds of sculptures, monuments, panels, mosaics, canvases around the world, more than 40 personal exhibitions of the muralist took place. The list of honorary titles, awards, prizes and other merits of the master is long. Today Zurab Tsereteli lives in Moscow, heads the Russian Academy of Arts and the Moscow Museum of Modern Art, and continues to work fruitfully.
The most famous muralist of our time was born on January 4, 1934 in Tbilisi. The formation of young Zurab on the path of creativity was determined by the atmosphere in which the boy's childhood passed. Parents did not belong to the world of art: mother Tamara Nizharadze devoted her life to home and children, father Konstantin Tsereteli worked as a mining engineer, taught at a technical university.
But his mother's brother George Nizharadze was a painter. Visiting his house, little Zurab not only learned to draw, but also was imbued with the aura of talk about art, because progressive people of that time came to visit his uncle. At the age of 8, Zurab entered the Tbilisi State Academy of Arts, from which he graduated "with excellent marks" in 1958.
It seemed that time itself dictated to the artist the development in the style of the monumental genre. The era of the 60s, industrialization, the development of virgin lands, the solution of global problems, mass construction and resettlement - all this was reflected in Tsereteli's desire to introduce novelty into what he does. And the first position - an artist-architect - gave me such an opportunity.
Among the works performed at that time are the decorations of the resort complexes of Georgia (Gagra, Sukhumi, Borjomi, Pitsunda). A feature of the master's work is mosaic painting. Bus stops in Abkhazia, created at the stage of early creativity in the early 60s and representing amazing art objects in the form of fantastic marine life, are a vivid example of it.
Along with artistic and decorative work, Tsereteli participates in exhibitions. The first success was brought by the painting “On Guard for Peace” at the exposition of the same name in Moscow. In 1967, a personal exhibition of the master took place in Tbilisi. Then he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the Georgian SSR.
Monument to St. George the Victorious in Tbilisi At the same time, Tsereteli is actively expanding the geography of its activities. One by one, orders are received for the design of a variety of buildings and structures: the Cinema House in Moscow (1967-1968), the Palace of Trade Unions in Tbilisi, the Sea Bottom swimming pool in Ulyanovsk (1969), the resort complex in Adler (1973), the hotel " Yalta-Intourist" in the Crimea (1978) and much more.
In the period of 70-80s, the master worked a lot and fruitfully. Since 1970, being the chief artist of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the USSR, he has been engaged in the decoration of the embassies of the Soviet Union abroad, travels a lot, gets acquainted with famous foreign artists. There is also a lot of work at home, especially after being appointed the chief artist of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. All this brings the master the honorary title People's Artist of the USSR in 1980.
Monument "Friendship forever" in Moscow The artist began work on monumental sculptures in the late 70s. The sculptural composition "Happiness for the children of the whole world" became a bright completion of the work. In 1983, the Friendship Forever monument was opened in Moscow, marking the 200th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Georgievsk between Russia and Georgia.
In the same year, in honor of this date, in his native Georgia, the artist built and opened the Arch of Friendship - a mosaic panel, which to this day pleases tourists on the Cross Pass near the Georgian Military Highway.
Monument to Marina Tsvetaeva in Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vi, France The master dedicated a number of sculptures to prominent figures of history and modernity. Among the bright creations of this direction: a monument to the poetess in Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vie (France) and Moscow, a monument in Apatity, a monument to John Paul II (France), in Moscow.
In 2017, the Alley of Rulers was opened in the Russian capital - a gallery of bronze busts by Zurab Tsereteli depicting the leaders of the Russian state from the era of Rurik to the 1917 revolution.
Monument to Peter the Great in Moscow But the monument involved the name of Tsereteli in a scandal. The public of the capital reacted extremely negatively both to the sculpture and to the idea of its erection, calling the first, as Izvestia wrote, "disfiguring the city." The king is depicted in full growth, standing on the deck of a giant sailing ship.
Even the question of the demolition of the monument was raised, but today the passions have subsided, and the monument continues to stand on an artificial island on the Moscow River, remaining one of the largest in the capital (height - 98 m, weight - over 2000 tons).
Monument "Adam's Apple" Tsereteli is no stranger to being under the gun of criticism: the master’s works are sometimes accused of gigantomania and bad taste, as was the case, for example, with the Adam’s Apple located in the Art Gallery he opened, or with the Fairy Tale Tree in the Moscow Zoo. The author himself takes this calmly.
While still studying at the Tbilisi Academy of Arts, Zurab Tsereteli met his future wife, Inessa Andronikashvili, who comes from a princely family. The couple have been married for over 45 years. In 1998, after the death of Inessa Alexandrovna, the artist organized the first solo exhibition in Moscow, named after his wife.
The daughter of Zurab Konstantinovich and Inessa Alexandrovna, Elena, and her children Vasily, Victoria and Zurab live in Moscow. Today, the Tsereteli family already has four great-grandchildren: Alexander, Nikolai, Philip, Maria Isabella.
The life of Zurab Tsereteli is closely connected with charity. Some of the works were created by the master free of charge, as a gift to this or that city, institution, fund.
The artist participates in charity exhibitions and auctions, directing funds from the sold works to fight childhood diseases.
By the way, in 2007 The Georgian Times included Zurab Tsereteli in the top ten richest people of Georgian nationality in the world, denoting the artist's fortune of $ 2 billion.
In 2018, Zurab Konstantinovich turned 84 years old. But the rhythm of creative life does not subside. The master creates, organizes exhibitions, gives master classes for children, takes part in interviews and poses for photos with pleasure, but most importantly, he is full of new ideas and projects. In 2016, the Tsereteli House Museum was opened in the village of Peredelkino near Moscow.
Zurab Tsereteli at a meeting with fans in 2018 In 2014, the muralist became a full cavalier of the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, receiving an award of the IV degree. The main secret of health and longevity, the sculptor calls constant work "without any vacations and vacation breaks."
President of the Russian Academy of Arts Zurab Konstantinovich Tsereteli has long been well known as the creator of sparkling mosaics and enamels, radiant stained-glass windows, grandiose compositions of cast and chased metal, and at the same time an outstanding painter with a memorable and vivid style of easel works.
Years go by, political and economic changes take place, entire historical epochs are replaced - the titanic work of Zurab Tsereteli continues and becomes larger and more significant. The artist "wins" city after city, one country after another, his monumental works appear in Tokyo and Brazil, Paris and London, New York and Seville. His creative work takes on a pronounced global character, and at the same time, he invariably remains true to the national aspirations of the art of Georgia and Russia, which brought him up.
The Museum and Exhibition Complex of the Russian Academy of Arts "Zurab Tsereteli Art Gallery" - the largest modern art center was opened in March 2001. It was created during the implementation of the work developed by the President of the Russian Academy of Arts Z.K. Tsereteli Academy transformation program. The complex is located in one of the most beautiful buildings in Moscow of the classicism era - the palace of the princes Dolgorukov.
Dolgorukovsky mansion
The permanent exposition of the Gallery consists of the works of ZK Tsereteli - painting, graphics, sculpture, enamel. Reliefs from the program cycle of works “My Contemporaries”, monumental enamels on biblical subjects are of great artistic value. The audience is constantly interested in the atrium hall, which is based on monumental sculptural compositions and bronze reliefs on the themes of the Old and New Testaments. Monthly in the impromptu workshop of the Z.K. Tsereteli conducts master classes.
Part of the permanent exhibition is a collection of casts from ancient sculpture.
Large-scale Russian and international exhibitions dedicated to all types of fine arts, architecture and design, the art of photography are held in the halls of the Art Gallery, musical evenings are held, and art treasures accumulated at the Academy throughout its history are constantly displayed.
Adam's apple hall
In the center of the hall is a huge building in the form of an apple. You go inside, quiet music plays, Adam and Eve stand in the center, holding hands, and along the dome, in the twilight, there are scenes of love.
Antique halls of the Tsereteli Gallery
Sculpture of the Patriarchs
Sculpture of Mother Teresa (in real life)… those wrinkles on her face… those veins on her arms. Seeing it in front of you, you forget that it is made of bronze. I have never seen such fine, delicate work! So much expression, so much power!
View of the exposition with the statue of Balzac
Sculptural composition "Ipatiev Night". It depicts the family of the last Russian Emperor Nicholas II before his death.
Vysotsky. The impetuosity of character, the impetuousness of music, the impetuousness of the style in which the sculpture is made.
High relief "Yuri Bashmet"
High relief "Rudolf Nureyev"
Luxurious restaurant in the "Art Gallery" Zurab Tsereteli.
Zurab Tsereteli Art Gallery - wedding.
Not everyone likes the work of Tsereteli, some find his work rude and pompous. Well! The greatness of the master is not to please everyone, but to leave no one indifferent.
I deliberately do not tell the biography of Z.K. Tsereteli, President of the Russian Academy of Arts, I do not list his awards and titles, all this is on the Internet and those who wish can read it on their own. But I want to say that in addition to the works presented in the Gallery, under his leadership and with his direct participation, a magnificent architectural and sculptural ensemble was created on Poklonnaya Hill.
Sculptural composition "The tragedy of peoples"
Monument to prisoners of Nazi concentration camps
and the Cathedral of Christ the Savior was restored.
It is too early to put an end to Tsereteli's work today. It continues with the same vigor and promising dynamism. The creative potential of the artist not only does not dry out, but, on the contrary, is gaining more and more strength. Shunning any bureaucratic administration, the artist preserves his creative independence like the apple of his eye, stubbornly defending the freedom of his chosen path. Wherever he works, he remains himself, offering "the city and the world" what he is capable of and how he lives. Zurab Tsereteli goes this way without stopping - with his inherent energy and purposefulness.
Zurab Konstantinovich is a huge bow and boundless respect for the most interesting and diverse work, invincible optimism and fortitude.
I wish everyone - both Muscovites and those who go to Moscow - to get to know the art of this amazing artist and sculptor better.
Official website of ZURAB TSERETELI: TSERETELI
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Name: Zurab Tsereteli
Zodiac sign: Capricorn
Age: 85 years old
Place of Birth: Tbilisi, Georgia
Activity: artist, sculptor, teacher, People's Artist of the USSR
tags: painter, sculptor
Family status: widower
The biography of Zurab Tsereteli is monumental as well as his work. The list of works of this outstanding artist includes hundreds of sculptures, monuments, panels, mosaics, canvases around the world, more than forty personal exhibitions of the muralist. The list of honorary titles, awards, prizes and other merits of the master is long. Today Zurab Tsereteli lives in Moscow, heads the Russian Academy of Arts and the Moscow Museum of Modern Art, and continues to work fruitfully.
The most popular muralist of our time was born on January 4, 1934 in Tbilisi. The formation of young Zurab on the path of creativity was determined by the atmosphere in which the boy grew up. Parents did not belong to the world of art: mother Tamara Nizharadze devoted her life to home and children, father Konstantin Tsereteli was a mining engineer, worked as a teacher at a technical university.
But his mother's brother George Nizharadze was a painter. Being in his house, little Zurab not only learned to draw, but also was imbued with the aura of talk about art, as progressive people of that time came to visit his uncle. At the age of eight, Zurab entered the Tbilisi State Academy of Arts, from which he graduated "with excellent marks" in 1958.
It seemed that time itself dictates the development of the artist in the style of the monumental genre. The era of the sixties, industrialization, the development of virgin lands, the solution of global problems, mass construction and resettlement - all this was reflected in Tsereteli's desire to introduce novelty into what he does. And the first job - an artist-architect - gave me such an opportunity.
Among the works performed during this period are the decorations of the resort complexes of Georgia (Gagra, Sukhumi, Borjomi, Pitsunda). A feature of the master's work is mosaic painting. Bus stops in Abkhazia, created at the stage of early creativity in the early sixties and representing amazing art objects in the form of fantastic marine life, were a vivid example of it.
Along with artistic and decorative work, Tsereteli takes part in exhibitions. The first success was brought by the painting “On Guard for Peace” at the exposition of the same name in Moscow. In 1967, a personal exhibition of the master was already held in Tbilisi. Then he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the Georgian SSR.
In parallel with this, Tsereteli is actively expanding the geography of its activities. Orders come one after another for the design of a variety of buildings and structures: the Cinema House in Moscow (1967-1968), the Palace of Trade Unions in Tbilisi, the Sea Bottom swimming pool in Ulyanovsk (1969), the resort complex in Adler (1973), the hotel " Yalta-Intourist" in the Crimea (1978) and much more.
In the period of 70-80s, the master worked a lot and fruitfully. Since the 1970s, being the chief artist of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the USSR, he has been engaged in the decoration of the embassies of the Soviet Union abroad, travels a lot, gets acquainted with popular foreign artists. He also worked hard at home, especially after his appointment as the chief artist of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. All this brings the master the honorary title People's Artist of the Soviet Union in the eightieth year.
The artist began work on monumental sculptures in the late seventies. The sculptural composition “Happiness for the children of the whole world” turned out to be a bright completion of the work. In 1983, the monument "Friendship Forever" was opened in Moscow, marking the bicentennial anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of St. George between the Russian Federation and Georgia.
In the same year, in honor of this date, in his native Georgia, the artist built and opened the Arch of Friendship - a mosaic panel, which even today gives joy to tourists on the Cross Pass near the Georgian Military Highway.
The master dedicated a number of sculptures to famous figures of history and modernity. Among the memorable creations of this direction: a monument to the poetess Marina Tsvetaeva in Saint-Gilles-Croix-de-Vi (France) and Moscow, a monument to Pushkin in Apatity, a monument to John Paul II (France), George the Victorious in Moscow.
The year before last, the Alley of Rulers was opened in Moscow - a gallery of bronze busts by Zurab Tsereteli depicting the leaders of the Russian state from the era of Rurik to the 1917 revolution.
But the monument to Peter the Great involved the name of the artist in a scandal. The public of the capital reacted very negatively both to the sculpture and to the idea of its erection, calling the former, as Izvestia reported, "disfiguring the city." The king is depicted in full growth, standing on the deck of a very large sailboat.
The question of demolishing the monument was even raised, but today the passions have calmed down, and the monument continues to stand on an artificial island on the Moscow River, remaining one of the largest in the capital (height - 98 m, weight - more than 2000 tons).
Tsereteli is not accustomed to being under the gun of criticism: the master's works are sometimes accused of gigantomania and bad taste, as was the case, for example, with the "Adam's Apple", located in the Art Gallery opened by him, or with the "Tree of Fairy Tales" in the Moscow Zoo. The author himself takes it calmly.
While still studying at the Tbilisi Academy of Arts, Zurab Tsereteli met his future wife Inessa Andronikashvili, who comes from a princely family. The couple have been married for over forty-five years. In 1998, after the death of Inessa Alexandrovna, the artist held the first solo exhibition in Moscow, named after his wife.
The daughter of Zurab Konstantinovich and Inessa Alexandrovna, Elena, and her children Vasily, Victoria and Zurab live in Moscow. To date, the Tsereteli family already has 4 great-grandchildren: Alexander, Nikolai, Philip, Maria Isabella.
The life of Zurab Tsereteli is closely intertwined with charity. Some works were created by the master free of charge, as a gift to this or that city, institution, fund.
The artist takes part in charity exhibitions and auctions, directing money from the sold works to fight childhood diseases.
It is worth noting that in 2007 The Georgian Times included Zurab Tsereteli in the top 10 richest people of Georgian nationality in the world, denoting the artist's fortune of $ 2 billion.
Last year, Zurab Konstantinovich turned 84 years old. However, the rhythm of creative life does not subside. The master creates, holds exhibitions, organizes master classes for children, is happy to participate in interviews and pose for photos, but most importantly, he is full of new ideas and projects. In 2016, the Tsereteli house-museum in the village of Peredelkino near Moscow opened its doors.
In 2014, the muralist became a full holder of the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, having received an award of the IV degree. The main secret of health and longevity, the sculptor calls the endless work "without any vacations and vacation breaks."
Works
