‘During the pandemic period, I began working with fabrics of different textures. During this time, I produced collages that were to be used in a book. Following the production of the collage abstractions, I started working on a series of flowers. It turned out to be large-scale paintings. Applying the technique of painting with watercolors on fabric assumed a more experimental character. After experimentation, I finally found my preferred materials, which gave me the possibility to work on the flower series.

Watercolor is so “loosely shaped” and textureless that sometimes it creates the illusion of a print. In reality, it is a painting. The confusing character of watercolor intrigues and interests me. Even though some of the works clearly represent a drawn flower, I have tried to make the images more abstract without losing the shape that reveals the essence of a plant and its structure. I have tried to preserve its notion, its shape, and the sensation, but at the same time make it abstract. You cannot completely neglect the shape of the flower.

My task is to create a painting. I chose to allow certain colors to dominate – one specific color or an entire range of colors in each picture, so that one painting turned out green, another one yellowish, and so on. All of the works are based on this principle. It takes a very long time to prepare the colors. That’s why you need to try them out in advance and conduct experiments on how each paint dries, what color it changes into, and so on. This is important in order to get the desired results in the end, but you do not know how it ends up looking. The intensity of the paints diminishes after they dry, and so they need to be maintained according to intuition and practice.

I used watercolor and tried to make the works somewhat different in terms of the color palette: maybe some consonance of the colors with each other… as if there is nothing there in reality. It needs neither to be important, nor to provoke thoughts about something and foster aspirations for ideas. It does not necessarily imply any further development. That is the whole point of creating these works.

I cannot say that these are totally abstract works, but abstract paintings always carry a certain meaning. In this case, I am far from saying that it’s the only truth, but the synergy of the colors, material, gloss, and all the components together gives me the feeling that there is nothing in reality.’

Vakho Bugadze