#georgian dancer

[batri-jopa]

Georgian Warrior

My another fanart of the most beautiful movie: And Then We Danced / და ჩვენ ვიცეკვეთ (2019) dir. Levan Akin

Help, I accidentally made a sociorealistic propaganda poster!😆 I really just wanted to make a picture to pair with Heracles but then things has gotten out of hand🤣

It felt a lot like drawing the same thing twice (a lot like drawing Merab The Rooster again). Also it always itches my ego to draw something that's already been captured in the movie... But there's actually not a single movie scene showing Merab's whole posture right after his final dance! This camera angle is just my own and nobody can take it away from me!🥰

Picture was inspired with the style of my favorite polish illustrator, Jan Marcin Szancer. Now every anatomical mistake you can blame on the stylization, lol, I'm brilliant💪

[batri-jopa]

Heracles

Irakli from And Then We Danced / და ჩვენ ვიცეკვეთ (2019) dir. Levan Akin

The original black and white version is below👇 Could you help me to choose which is better?

Could it be that nobody before me made a fanart of Irakli in this scene?!?😳

I mean just look at it: you have an awesome gorgeous looking character who's name is Irakli (Georgian version of the name "Heracles") - showing off his dancing skills and most probably appearing like a demi-god in Merabi's eyes...

I tried to suggest the branches outside the window could resemble a lightning. To make it feel more greek-god-like, you know

The only thing that turned out quite nice in the "failed" version was the face:

Now if to be frank I already tried drawing this movie scene once - exactly a year ago, in October 2022. I wasted few hours on this, yet failed miserably and it was so painful I wanted not even touch it... But now a year has passed and I'm happy that I did try again!!!💪

(you're looking at your own risk)

...but the rest was so wrong and generally fucked up...🤦

[batri-jopa]

I'll be talking about #ATWD kintouri trail now.

It goes like this: you watch the movie And Then We Danced (2019, dir. Levan Akin) for the first time. Maybe even stay for the whole End Credits because of that enchanting beautiful music... And you notice the very last song in the credits is a little different. Sounds really old, unclear and... well generally not so very great. Probably been put in end credits to correspond with those old films of georgian dances the movie begins with, you think. Yeah, fair enough, you think.

Only a tiny detail more: its name is Kinto's Song.

Rings a bell? Like: hey, wait a minute, wasn't the dance that boys were dancing also named kintouri?

So, yeah, you've found the connection, you can be proud of yourself! Now if you decided not to be obsessed with ATWD you feel satisfied enough already and just go on and live your life...

Otherwise - you start to dig.

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First of all: what does kinto (კინტო) mean?

In old Tblisi (end of XIX century, beginning of XX) Kintos were small merchants, often street fruit sellers, usually carrying their goods on their heads around the city.

Their lifestyle was not like the rest of the georgian society and their traditional clothes were different from other Georgians as well: instead of chokha Kinto was wearing black outfit with baggy pants and a silk shawl hanging from his silver belt - the shawl was to wrap the fruits and vegetables in them to weight.

Sources (read if you're interested): [X], [X], [X]

So, young males and rather poor ones. And without families in the very family-centred georgian society... I don't think it's very surprising to learn that homosexuality wasn't rare among their community (although that's the part you won't find on georgian wikipedia). Even less knowing that when you're on the bottom of the social ladder it's finally where nobody around cares about your life anymore🤷 (I only wonder if it was rather the primal reason for anyone to leave his home and choose a life like this or if it was finding out ones orientation due to mainly interacting with other men. I suppose it might have worked both ways?)

Then we come to the "traditional georgian dance" issue: Kinto's traditional dance is kintouri (or Kintauri, კინტოური) also known as shalakho (შალახო) and it is said to be informal and light natured. I've also read that some of its parts (like hands movements) are of Persian origin. A female Persian dance specifically. [X]

Of course when Kintouri became a part of official Traditional Georgian Ballet - it went through some changes. As was mentioned in And Then We Danced in the last 50 years it became more "masculine", just like adjaruli and other Georgian Dances. So before that I believe it could have been more like this?

It's Fridon Sulaberidze (ფრიდონ სულაბერიძე) who was born in 1941 but I have no idea what year the film is showing😕 probably 1970's?

Now finally: what is the Kinto's Song? It is the song recorded on X-ray plate almost hundred years ago and found in 2018. Illegal song: song of a man loving two other men. I guess Levan Akin must have found the song quite recently before making And Then We Danced (2019).

Knowing all that historical and cultural context - I can not imagine any better fitting song for the end of the movie about struggling between your tradition and culture and your love to another guy...

That movie is a masterpiece in every little detail!🥰❤❤

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Of course it's just a beginning - what I wanted to indicate just now is that the song in End Credits is a hint to kintouri being a trail to follow throughout the movie. Furthermore I want to show you how it may lead to see few movie scenes in a little bit different light (like here), so expect me talking more about #ATWD kintouri trail from time to time

[batri-jopa]

Eka, dancing kintouri at the wedding

In Bloom / გრძელი ნათელი დღეები (2013) dir. Nana Ekvtimishvili and Simon Groß

[batri-jopa]

Another of mine #bird version ATWD fanarts:

This time Merab and Mari in their adjaruli dancing practice

These are my fanarts of the movie AND THEN WE DANCED / და ჩვენ ვიცეკვეთ (2019, dir. Levan Akin) - I'm depicting those characters as birds, mostly roosters and hens.

[batri-jopa]

Ever since I watched the movie And Then We Danced / და ჩვენ ვიცეკვეთ (2019, dir. Levan Akin) and absolutely fell in love with it 🥰 I felt an urge to make quality fanart of it! But I was afraid of ruining their perfect faces... So after a thought that moves of Georgian dancers remind me a bit of a fighting roosters - I flew with those below:

Inspired a bit with the movie poster combined with Merab's final dance, then with the "Honey" scene and the kvevri scene too.

I think rooster is a actually a majestic animal and I tried my best to make those pictures kind of symbolic... and just a little bit cute, maybe😁

EDIT in August 2022: I already made more fanarts in this alternative #bird version ATWD (9 specifically, I hope it will give you smile!😊) but there's also my other #ATWD fanart depicting them as humans!😉

[batri-jopa]

Eka dancing kintouri

In Bloom / გრძელი ნათელი დღეები (2013) dir. Nana Ekvtimishvili and Simon Groß

[batri-jopa]

გიორგი ზედგინიძე / ანსამბლი როკვა / Dancer - Giorgi Zedginidze / Ensemble Rokva / CHUB1NA.GE