Soviet Dagestan goldsmith Manaba Magomedova

Soviet Dagestan goldsmith Manaba Magomedova

The range of works created by Manaba Omarovna Magomedova (November 5, 1928, Kubachi – March 10, 2013, Makhachkala) is unusually wide. In particular, decorations (bracelets, rings, necklaces), book salvage, utensils (pitchers, dishes, cups, cups), weapons, decorative chandeliers of large and small forms. Magomedova- a well-known metal artist. Member of the Union of Artists of the USSR and Russia (1960), People’s Artist of Dagestan (1978), and Honored Artist of the Russian Federation (2003). The first woman in Dagestan is a goldsmith, laureate of numerous republican, all-Union and foreign exhibitions and competitions, Honored Artist of Russia, People’s Artist of Georgia and Dagestan, Chevalier of the Order of Honor of Georgia. Her works participated in more than one hundred prestigious exhibitions. Besides, she represented the country at international symposiums and seminars. Personal exhibitions of the artist took place in Moscow, Makhachkala, Tbilisi, Jablonec nad Nisou (Czech Republic), Rangoon, Algiers, Budapest, Székesfehérvár (Hungary), and Istanbul. Her works received awards of different countries, and gold, silver and bronze medals of the Exhibition of Economic Achievements of the USSR.
Meanwhile, admiring the artist’s work, poet Rasul Gamzatov wrote about her: “It is impossible to imagine that her almost childish hands were forging and burning metal. In the works she created, I see a poetic dream of perfect beauty.”

Creativity of Manaba Magomedova is a unique example of the development of the author’s art on the basis of folk tradition. In her life and work, a purposeful, conscious study of the national tradition combined with a keen interest in contemporary art, its forms and styles, and the highest achievements of world culture. It was on this basis that a new type of jeweler was formed: bold, open to everything new, creating the individual style. Manaba was not afraid to depart from tradition, hidden or explicit, living in it, as something received from birth.

Interestingly, Manaba Magomedova was also a fine ethnographer, photographer and art critic. Her collection includes photographs taken on trips and expeditions to Dagestan and Georgia from the 1950s to the 1970s. The recorded impressions continue the unique and recognizable image of Manaba Magomedova, the beauty and strength of her personality. Like all the art of Manaba, her photo art is monumental. Caucasian Madonnas, children, holidays, gravestones, women at work, harsh mountains and people in the mountains – as an ode and a declaration of love for her native Dagestan. Born and raised in the village of Kubachi, Dagestan, she also loved Georgia, where she lived almost all her life.

Dagestan woman from the aul Kubachi, master of art, still a prerogative of men, is an artist of a special profession, not just a jeweler (the first woman in Dagestan), but a goldsmith capable of turning any metal into a precious one. Eleven times the tools of gold and silver affairs of the master passed into the family of Magomedov from father to son. But for the twelfth time fate has awarded a daughter with a talent, strong character, tenacity and creative gift. Manaba with equal skill owned different ways of processing silver and other metals – filigree, engraving, incision, inlay, niello, cloisonne, vyemchatoy and other types of enamels. In her work, an organic combination of Kubachi traditions and innovative ideas brings fresh and unexpected solutions to the established ideas about form and composition. Masterfully owning a variety of techniques and, each time varying them, the artist achieved the embodiment of ideological design and emotional impact, harmony and beauty, which made her works genuine works of art.

The amazing works of Manaba are in museums of Georgia, Dagestan, Russia and abroad, as well as in private collections of many countries. Participant of more than one hundred international and republican exhibitions, she also was the author of jewelry for the film by Tengiz Abuladze “Necklace for my beloved.” The traditional for the family business continues the daughter Leila, who, following her parents, chose the artist’s path and creates works of extraordinary beauty.

Soviet Dagestan goldsmith Manaba Magomedova

Source:
Patterns of Life. Manaba Magomedova. Soviet Russia. Moscow. 1974