Description
G. Lomidze's 1975 illustration "The Umbrella" is a sharp satire on the communal and infrastructural problems of Tbilisi. The TV tower erected on Mtatsminda, covered by a gigantic umbrella, and the torrents coming down from the houses of Old Tbilisi beneath it, symbolically express the city's vulnerability to rainfall. An accompanying poem explains that the rain damages roofs, floods apartments, and undermines building foundations. The drawing ridicules systemic inaction, where, instead of actually repairing the buildings, a ridiculous "solution" of covering the city with a giant umbrella is proposed. The artwork exposes an ineffective approach that leaves the population with only fantastical "means of defense" instead of solving the problem.
