Georgian artist Rusudan Khizanishvili (b. 1979) creates vivid, symbol-laden paintings which draw on Georgian iconography, regional history, and folklore. Raised in post-Soviet Georgia and based in Tbilisi, she channels both ancestral memory and the region’s turbulent past into dreamlike, altered realities populated by hybrid figures and chimeric forms. Her compositions echo the theatricality embedded in Georgian culture, animated by an intuitive approach to colour – “brainwaves,” as she describes them – that heightens the mystical and emotional charge of her imagery. 

Across her work, Khizanishvili explores cultural memory, the female body, and myth, drawing on archetypes, ecofeminist thought, and an evolving interest in transhumanism. Women appear as protectors, warriors, and shape-shifters, their patterned garments and symbolic armour recalling both ancient goddesses and the legacy of Queen Tamar. These figures reflect the artist’s own experience of growing up with a single mother in a patriarchal society while forging her own independent artistic path. She was represented by LJ Galerie at Asia NOW 2025.