“This is the city where I live and I love it. Although there were times when there was nothing to love. But I still loved it, even then.”
In the beginning Gogi Tsagareli went to war for a story for magazines , then he went because he knew he had to be there and to capture its reality. He went as a volunteer in Samachablo where he was captured and then to Abkhazia where from the frontline he documented one of Georgias most painful conflicts. His images now stand and testament to the cruelty of conflict and the enduring scars they inevitably leave behind. Tsagareli’s images preserve this conflict for the photographic historical record – capturing some of the most decisive moments of the war. Coming back from Abkhazia he went to another frontline – his home. Civil war had erupted in Tbilisi tearing apart his city.
„This is the city where I live and I love it. Although there were times when there was nothing to love. But I still loved it, even then “. This kind of love created Gogi Tsagareli’s photography through the years. He photographed the direst and most painful side of people – the wars in Caucasus and most severe social issues, and throughout all this he dedicated his work to people and humanity, even when it seemed to have disappeared and when we most likely no longer deserved it.