David (Data) Chigholashvili was born on October 18, 1988 in Tbilisi. He has received his BA in general humanities specializing in history, politics and culture from the University of Georgia, Tbilisi where he has also done two years of MA level studies in social and cultural anthropology. In 2012 he has obtained his MSc in Social Anthropology from the University of Edinburgh with the MSc dissertation – “Thinking through Contemporary Visual Art: the Case of Tbilisi’s Urban Transformation.”

He has continued his research on a PhD level in anthropology at the Tbilisi State University. His primary research areas are visual and urban anthropology and he focuses on urban aspects of Georgia through visual representations, as well as looks for important collaboration potentials between contemporary art and anthropology. He has worked on various research and administrative positions and is currently involved with GeoAIR, Contemporary Art Organization in Tbilisi. Additionally, Data has presented on international conferences regarding topics of his research interests.

Data’s research within the HBF Regional Scholarship will analyze Tbilisi’s makeover through pictorial imaginations of different characters. From the perspective of his general research interests and respective fieldwork, he will examine the expression of Tbilisi’s transformation in various pictorial representations and their social role. Moreover, he will focus on the images of the past and the contemporary ones, as well of Tbilisi’s future imaginations.