Ucha Dzhaparidze

Born Aug. 4 (17), 1906, in the village of Gari, present-day Oni Raion, Georgian SSR. Soviet painter and graphic artist. People’s Artist of the USSR (1963), member of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1958). Member of the CPSU from 1944.

Dzhaparidze studied at the Mose Toidze People’s Art Studio (1922-24) and the Tbilisi Academy of Arts (1924-25 and 1928-31). He began teaching at the Tbilisi Academy of Arts in 1936; he became a professor there in 1944. He was the director of the academy from 1942 to 1948. In his historical paintings, he strives for heroic and romantic representation (for example, May Day Demonstration in Tbilisi in 1901, tempera, 1939-41, at the Georgian branch of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism, Tbilisi; State Prize of the USSR in 1942). Dzhaparidze also paints book illustrations, genre pictures (for example, Friends of Youth, 1938 and A Mother’s Thoughts, 1945, both at the Museum of Arts of the Georgian SSR, Tbilisi) and portraits (for example, U. Chkheidze, pastel, 1943). Another example of his work is Parting Words, which is in a private collection in the United States. Dzhaparidze has been awarded the Order of Lenin, four other orders, and various medals.