Tbilisi Hosts Exhibition on Georgian Genius in American Aviation
The Georgian National Museum and Alexander Kartveli Association are presenting an exhibition dedicated to military aircraft designers in history. The exhibition is taking place at the Simon Janashi Museum on November 17th and will last until May 1st. The exhibition will demonstrate the life of Alexander Kartveli, who was a Georgian immigrant and an innovator of American and World aviation. Kartveli was born on September 9th 1896 in Tbilisi.
He had run away from the Bolsheviks in order to make his dream come true along with his mother and emigrated. In the 1920’s he earned a reputation in the Paris aviation scene and met US aviation entrepreneur Charles Levine. After that he left the country and immigrated to the USA. His designs for the A-10 still remain revered in by the US even after Kartveli’s death.
Materials on Kartveli preserved in the Smithsonian Institute and NASA’s archives have become available after removing Kartveli’s information from its “classified” status.
During WW2 a wider audience learned about Kartveli. Fundamental engineering solutions developed by Kartveli responded to the era’s challenges of Franklin D Roosvelt, Harry Truman and America aviation pioneer Charles Lindberg.
The exhibition will showcase models of the aircraft designed by Kartveli, blueprints, archives, documentation, different articles, photos and multimedia materials. The exhibition is supported by Tbilisi City Hall and the National Archives of Georgia.
Address: Simon Janashia Museum of Georgia, 3 Shota Rustaveli Avenue
Nina Ioseliani