Public Wine Project

 

My first experience visiting Georgia was in the second half of October 2011, when many grape trees were bearing fruit. During my stay in Tbilisi, I discovered a great number of grapes growing in public areas.

It has been reported that Georgia's wine is the oldest in the world dating back to 6000 BC. Eventually, I realized that people really live among grapes. Homemade wine is brewed after the harvest in autumn, the tree branches are baked for use at barbecues, and the vines and leaves are also used as traditional ingredients to wrap minced meat.

I have decided to produce self-made wine from these grapes that were collected from Tbilisi's public areas and private gardens.

The Public Wine Project has been designed as a three-year project and is composed of two parts: collect grapes and produce homemade wine with local people while interviewing them about wine. The results will be displayed in a stall-like documentation room that I will name YATAI.

In the first year, I produced 25 liters of homemade wine and created a skeleton of the movable wooden stall. I call this wooden construction a "progress installation", with the intention of improving it in the following years.

The Public Wine Project not only aims to produce homemade wine, but focuses on people's traditional lives. The wine is made from various seeds that come from different parts of Tbilisi, thus trying to portray a taste of public space.

 

Installation Wine YATAI

© 2004- Jun'ichiro ISHII