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ABSTRACT
In 1938, the Soviet Georgian administration inaugurated the iconic Institute of Marx, Engels, and Lenin (IMEL) in Tbilisi under pretences of socialist unity and friendship among Soviet nations. Three quarters of a century later, the same building – now privatised, heavily renovated, and re-branded – was re-inaugurated as the seven-star Biltmore Hotel. The hotel’s grand opening included an enormous video projection on the western façade, telling the story of a new friendship among nations, this time between independent Georgia and the United Arab Emirates as the hotel’s financiers. This article tracks the shifting politics of cultural diplomacy associated with this adaptive reuse project. It contributes to a growing body of scholarship on cultural diplomacy by delving deeper into the social, political, and economic implications surrounding the particular use of friendship rhetoric in such practices. In doing so, it charts the manipulation of architecture to communicate international cooperation and the power of its patrons. Drawing from archival sources, field observations, media analysis, and focus groups, the work argues that, rather than an outmoded means of public service announcement, symbolic architecture continues to be a crucial arena for state politics, one entangled with new modes of spectacle in the city.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the interview and focus group participants for sharing their valuable insight and opinions. The authors also thank David Gogishvili and the journal’s editor and reviewers for providing helpful comments. An early draft of this work received thoughtful feedback during a lecture given at Carleton University’s EURUS program.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. The six focus groups with Tbilisi residents were comprised of eight adult participants each, aged 18+, broken down by geographic area and age group, with mixed gender. Focus groups were administered in November 2019.
2. In 1937–8, the All-Ukrainian Association of Marxist-Leninist Scientific Research Institutes (VUAMLIN) was dissolved and replaced in 1939 by the Ukrainian branch of the Institute of Marx-Engels-Lenin.
3. Georgia was under the control of the Ottomans in the mid-fifteenth century to nineteenth century; the control of Imperial Russia in the nineteenth to twentieth century; and the control of the Soviets between 1921–1991.
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Suzanne Harris-Brandts
Suzanne Harris-Brandts is Assistant Professor of Architecture & Urbanism, and Faculty Associate at the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (EURUS) at Carleton University. She received her PhD in Urban and Regional Studies from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research brings together design and the social sciences to explore issues of power, equity, and collective identity in the built environment. It covers topics like iconic city building, incentivised urbanism, contested place meanings, and design’s relationship to conflict-induced displacement. Harris-Brandts’s current book project, Constructing the Capital, draws from her dissertation uncovering the politics of urban development and image-making in Eurasian capital cities. It foregrounds city building campaigns in hybrid regimes, demonstrating how architecture and urban design are manipulated for power, also highlighting bottom-up, community-based strategies to resist such actions. Harris-Brandts has published on the politics of the built environment for journals like Nationalities Papers, Eurasian Geography & Economics, European Planning Studies, and Caucasus Survey. She is co-applicant on the Georgian Rustaveli National Science Foundation grant ‘Examining the Social Impacts of Large, Private Sector Urban Development in Batumi and Tbilisi’ (2019-2022), as well as the Canadian SSHRC-funded Insight Grant ‘Gardens Otherwise and Elsewhere: A Historical and Ethnographic study of Georgian Gardens’ (2021-2026).
David Sichinava holds a PhD in Human Geography from Tbilisi State University where he is an assistant professor cross-appointed with the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences and the International School of Economics. Sichinava also lectures at Carleton University’s Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (EURUS) in Ottawa, Canada. Previously, he was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar in Geography at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Sichinava’s research focuses on the social, spatial, and temporal aspects of inequity, the politics of urban development, and the role of civil society in urban policy. He is Principal Investigator on the Georgian Rustaveli National Science Foundation grant ‘Examining the Social Impacts of Large, Private Sector Urban Development in Batumi and Tbilisi’ (2019-2022). As a Research Director at the Caucasus Research Resource Centre (CRRC-Georgia) in Tbilisi, Georgia, Sichinava has also led projects investigating regional geopolitics and issues of minority inclusion. Among his recent publications are book chapters for ‘Recovery: Intersecting Displacement with Post War Reconstruction’ (edited by Al-Harithy, Routledge, 2021), ‘Georgia: From Autocracy to Democracy’ (edited by Jones & MacFarlane, University of Toronto Press, 2020), and ‘Urban Activism in Eastern Europe and Eurasia’ (edited by Dariyeva & Neugebauer, DOM Publishers, 2020).
David Sichinava
Suzanne Harris-Brandts is Assistant Professor of Architecture & Urbanism, and Faculty Associate at the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (EURUS) at Carleton University. She received her PhD in Urban and Regional Studies from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research brings together design and the social sciences to explore issues of power, equity, and collective identity in the built environment. It covers topics like iconic city building, incentivised urbanism, contested place meanings, and design’s relationship to conflict-induced displacement. Harris-Brandts’s current book project, Constructing the Capital, draws from her dissertation uncovering the politics of urban development and image-making in Eurasian capital cities. It foregrounds city building campaigns in hybrid regimes, demonstrating how architecture and urban design are manipulated for power, also highlighting bottom-up, community-based strategies to resist such actions. Harris-Brandts has published on the politics of the built environment for journals like Nationalities Papers, Eurasian Geography & Economics, European Planning Studies, and Caucasus Survey. She is co-applicant on the Georgian Rustaveli National Science Foundation grant ‘Examining the Social Impacts of Large, Private Sector Urban Development in Batumi and Tbilisi’ (2019-2022), as well as the Canadian SSHRC-funded Insight Grant ‘Gardens Otherwise and Elsewhere: A Historical and Ethnographic study of Georgian Gardens’ (2021-2026).
David Sichinava holds a PhD in Human Geography from Tbilisi State University where he is an assistant professor cross-appointed with the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences and the International School of Economics. Sichinava also lectures at Carleton University’s Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (EURUS) in Ottawa, Canada. Previously, he was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar in Geography at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Sichinava’s research focuses on the social, spatial, and temporal aspects of inequity, the politics of urban development, and the role of civil society in urban policy. He is Principal Investigator on the Georgian Rustaveli National Science Foundation grant ‘Examining the Social Impacts of Large, Private Sector Urban Development in Batumi and Tbilisi’ (2019-2022). As a Research Director at the Caucasus Research Resource Centre (CRRC-Georgia) in Tbilisi, Georgia, Sichinava has also led projects investigating regional geopolitics and issues of minority inclusion. Among his recent publications are book chapters for ‘Recovery: Intersecting Displacement with Post War Reconstruction’ (edited by Al-Harithy, Routledge, 2021), ‘Georgia: From Autocracy to Democracy’ (edited by Jones & MacFarlane, University of Toronto Press, 2020), and ‘Urban Activism in Eastern Europe and Eurasia’ (edited by Dariyeva & Neugebauer, DOM Publishers, 2020).