When the Manship School of Mass Communication moves into the new Journalism Building in April, the eyes of faculty, staff and students will be focused on art by Gia Bugadze.
Manship School Dean Jack Hamilton commissioned Bugadze, rector of the Academy of Art in the Republic of Georgia, to paint 12 images representing freedom of speech and information in a blossoming democracy.
Bugadze, a native of Tbilisis, Georgia, arrived in Baton Rouge last Monday and began working in a temporary studio in the basement of Atkinson Hall Wednesday.
“He is the premier painter in the Republic of Georgia,” said Adrienne Moore, the director of the Reilly Center for Media and Public Affairs.
Hamilton chose the theme of freedom of speech and information to go with the opening of the newly-renovated journalism building.
“Knowledge, basically information, is protecting human beings and humanity,” Bugadze said through his interpreter, Nino Danelia.
The work will consist of 12 individual paintings under one common theme. They will hang together in the freedom of speech forum in the new Journalism Building. Bugadze referred to the project as “a combination of 12 paintings in one.”
For his medium, Bugadze chose acrylic paint. The paintings are filled with bright whites, deep blues and vivid pinks.
Hamilton, who met Bugadze while in Tbilisis, said he approached Bugadze about doing the paintings a few years ago.
“Knowing Gia, he probably began work on [the idea] when he agreed to do it, but, nothing is written down,” Hamilton said. “He doesn’t draw it before he does it.”
According to Mary Ann Sternberg, the internship coordinator for the Manship School, Bugadze will be paid through private funds which were earmarked for the project.
The family of W. Lee Hargrave, a graduate of the Manship school and former LSU Law School professor, made the principal donation for the project.
In addition to the Hargrave family, six other contributors gave to the project.
Sternberg said she could not give a specific dollar amount to The Reveille since the project was being paid for completely with private funds.
When completed, the paintings will be installed in the new 5,000-square foot Jensen Holliday forum under the new rotunda, which will be the focal point of the renovated Journalism Building.