THOSE TWO ON THE STREETS

Mariam:
'There is the two of us- Mariam Natroshvili and Detu Jincharadze, so the name Those Two comes from here. We’ve been living and working together for over two years. The first project we did together was the ‘Poetry on concrete’- a stencil of the poem by Karlo Kacharava. We wanted to bring the Georgian contemporary poetry to the streets- the city as a book.

In the spring of 2013 we started a project http (Hyper Text transfer protocol). We have transferred the words and phrases we encounter daily in the social networks, mail, different sites or computer desktop on the walls of the streets. These words and phrases have mutated and have adopted a completely different meanings due to the new technology and this is a fascinating material. Bringing back these words from the virtual to our actual reality is a game of its own. Playing with the definitions. When these words are taken out of the context of virtual reality and brought to the urban settings they lose their adopted significance; they return their primary meanings and at the same time they attach new implications.

Words and phrases which have changed their meanings in world wide web and social pages, find new definitions in various urban spaces.

SLEEP -

1. A condition of body and mind such as that which typically re­curs for several hours every night, in which the nervous system is inactive.

2.An energy-saving mode of operation in which all unnecessary components are shut down.

3. Within the project http definition of the phrases and words are individual, depending on the emotional and physical conditions of a person.

Choosing the locations and words happens involuntarily. First we find the place and it dictates the phrase. Sometimes these words are connected to the biography or the emotional vibe of the space. Sometimes it personifies our attitude towards it. We prompted for the easiest font, not thinking about the form at all. Generally, I find the form secondary- the content is always more important for me. However, secondary does not mean insignificant.

It is far more responsible to create street art than the white cube gallery art.  When you do something on the street- a drawing, text or performance, you start a dialogue with the part of the society that might not be interested in art at all. I think the content is more important in here too. A painting or graffiti on its own is not exciting for me if there is no message in it. Generally, I am for the conceptual art be it in the open or closed space; and conceptual terrorism, I think art has to be terroristic. It has to hurt you, astonish and wake you up. Poetic terrorism as one used to say. The street is a free zone for me and art in the streets is a contrast to the consumerist and commercial culture.

The museum of Superstitions is our latest project, created as a part of the Batumi Backyard stories. This is the second year for the project with the author and initiator Levan Khujadze and the curator Magda Guruli. One of the exhibition spaces this year was the abandoned building of a bathhouse. It was built in 1910, a synthesis of Eastern and European architecture; the ceramic tiles were brought from Venice, with the Islamic domes. The cheap Soviet tiles also appear on the walls.

According to the legend, evil souls and Jinni dwell in the abandoned bathhouses- they love water. Thus we decided to conduct a research and to present the collected information in this bathhouse. The bathhouse itself is for cleansing the body, for getting rid of the negative energy, a space for rituals; it was transformed into a ghost museum for remembering and comprehending the superstitions and old sayings; some sort of an archive.  

The two rooms that were dedicated to the ghost museum showcased the superstitions, wisdom and beliefs collected from the locals that nowadays have lost their resonance. The process itself was very engaging-collecting the materials and meeting new people. We’ve met Joha that makes talismans and spells, the fishermen who taught us the magic of guessing the weather, the fortunetellers who read hieroglyphs off the coffee-stained cups. Some of the information was new to us, some we already knew of.  ‘If you go through a rainbow a boy becomes a girl and vice versa’- is my favourite.

Learning the signs of nature, predicting the future, learning the languages of rain, wind and sea; the spells for better luck, to protect from an evil eye- all of these were the part of daily life that has now disappeared. The archeology and achieving of this information should be fascinating even for the anthropologists.

The other artwork created for the Batumi Backyard Stories is the stencil on a transformer in one of the yards. The text in this case is Georgian- ‘Today or Tomorrow’. It was the phrase we’ve heard the most in those two weeks; from the neighbours, friends, fishermen, waiters, fortunetellers. ‘Today or tomorrow’ is the uncertainty, waiting for something that will ultimately change everything.

So be it the streets, bridges, unknown cities, abandoned stations, absurd buildings, ghost bathhouses, derelict army bases or the non-existent factories, art for us is a game-without permission, magical and ephemeral; that something to change all.'