Culture Ministry returns paintings from Georgia's Iran Embassy, says 11 other pieces missing since 90s

The Georgian Culture Ministry on Tuesday announced it had returned four paintings by Georgian artists to the country from the Georgian Embassy in Iran, and said 11 other pieces were "missing" from a group of works moved out of Georgia in the 1990s.

The four works, created by four different artists and moved from the Tbilisi-based National Gallery into the Embassy in 1995 among 15 pieces, have now been brought back to the venue, in the latest development in a controversy that has involved the Ministry on the one hand, and the Georgian National Museum on the other over the recent months.

Created by painters Dimitri Khakhutashvili, Shota Lezhava, Zaur Deisadze and Grigol Chirinashvili, the works were displayed to reporters at a press briefing where Minister Thea Tsulukiani spoke about the process of returning the paintings.

In a social media release, the Ministry also made references to the venues related to the works, saying neither the GNM network nor the National Gallery had inquired about the whereabouts of the works until 2012, when Ambassador Giorgi Janjghava began collecting them at the Embassy in Iran.

The Ministry said 11 other paintings were in the group moved out of Georgia to Iran in 1995 and were being searched for. Photo via Ministry of Culture, Sport and Youth of Georgia

The comments follow debates and controversy over the fate of artworks moved from Georgian museums to embassies of the country in the 1990s, with the social, economic and political upheaval in Georgia throughout the decade leading to a lack of organised information about their fate by the time the GNM network was formed in 2005 to take over management of museum exhibits.

The process of the Ministry returning works back to museum and gallery venues from diplomatic offices abroad started soon after Tsulukiani's appointment in spring of last year. It has been accompanied by mutual accusations between the GNM and a part of the public on the one hand, and the Ministry on the other.

The former have viewed criticisms by the Ministry over the fate of the artworks as politically motivated charges, with the debates becoming a part of a larger controversy between Tsulukiani and a part of the culture field professionals in the country since her appointment.

As part of the process, the Ministry returned 12 paintings located in its offices to the Museum of Fine Arts and National Gallery in May 2021; in September, four pieces found in the Czech Republic were also brought back to the latter venue; and in November, six artworks were returned from the Academy of Sciences and Art of Russia.