I wanted to make a short film that was not only about Mariana Chkonia and her flying carpets, but that might also act as a mirror or become an artefact that held the energy and temperament of the woman herself. I suppose I am thinking of the feeling I’ve felt after spending time with Mariana, which is somewhere between a vast calmness, something grounded and of the earth, genuine, warm, the moment, perhaps, those precious seconds when one wakes before our worries and insecurities wake too, but also something strong and energetic, a quiet propulsion and confidence that inspires at least this author to pursue the creative projects of his own.
Of course, these were just ideas, and mostly I kept them to myself, although as December turned to January I could not stop thinking about a certain image: water pouring over a carpet, water nourishing her textiles as if they were plants. I had never been to Mariana’s studio in Nukuriani, only her apartment in Tbilisi, but I had seen those wonderful photos taken by Daro Sulakauri, and as I lived in that hypothetical scene I noticed other images and ideas begin to announce themselves too. Mostly they came in fragments: flowers and bees, trees, leaves, carpets moving slowly in the wind, wine glasses, faces listening, hands pushing into wool, hands washing vegetables, water dripping, threads, fibres, textures, rooms of wool bathed in light. It seems obvious now that I was trying to escape that seemingly endless Parisian winter, that I wanted to return to a place I had never been, to Mariana’s world, a garden where everything felt slow and natural and alive.
close
