Exhibition
Admission and participation free of charge

Vernissage
20 September 2024, 19:00

Lecture "What does it mean to be a genius?"
21 September 2024, 15:00

After Parajanov - Cinematographic Photo Collages for his 100th Birthday

We are delighted to once again present the renowned Georgian photographer Yuri Mechitov at the nEUROPA gallery. Mechitov accompanied the career of the influential and controversial Soviet director Sergei Parajanov with his camera for many years. He created milestones in Soviet film history with films such as "The Shadows of Our Forgotten Ancestors" and "The Colour of Pomegranates". The photographer's collaboration and friendship with Parajanov resulted in an impressive photographic biography of the director.

Yuri Mechitov is showing Sergei Parajanov collages in Central Europe for the first time

Mechitov's surrealist-Dadaist collages from his own photographs (portraits of Parajanov) and newspaper clippings, which have never been shown in Central Europe before, creatively and provocatively combine three artistic means of expression (collage, photography, film) to create a homage to the filmmaker's artistic genius. With this visual hypertextuality, he interprets the essence of Paradjanov's unique style, his emotionality and his artistic vision, offering a special insight into his creative universe. Mechitov's fascination with Parajanov, reflects the poetry and surreal beauty of Parajanov's world in the three media of photography, film and collage.

"These collages of mine were naturally created under the great influence of the artistic works of Sergei Parajanov, who was an unrivalled master of this art form. His amazing works were characterised by the variety of meanings, elegance of composition, spontaneity and apparent ease of execution. In my works, the hero of the collages is Parajanov himself. I have kept the old pictures of Sergei, which I use in the collages, in the form of test strips that I made when enlarging the photographs. This work is not yet finished, I expect to create a series of further images, knowing that you can't compete with the maestro, but you can create something that allows us to see the life of this brilliant man in a new way."

Yuri Mechitov was born on 10 May 1950 in Tbilisi, Georgia. He began taking photographs at the age of 8, but it was only later that he began to think seriously about photography. His first exhibition took place in Tbilisi in 1979, followed by over 20 solo and 50 group exhibitions in Georgia and internationally. Initially working in the documentary field, he discovered his passion for portrait photography. Accompanied by artists such as Mark Polyakov, Sergey Parajanov and Vladimir Pichkhadze, he received valuable impulses for his art.

Yuri Mechitov will be present at the vernissage and will also give a lecture on Saturday, 21 September 2024, on the topic "What does it mean to be a genius?" in reference to Parajanov.

Curation: Matthias Schumann

The project is funded by the State Ministry for Social Affairs and Social Cohesion. This measure is co-financed with tax funds on the basis of the budget adopted by the Saxon State Parliament as part of the funding programme "Wir für Sachsen".