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This text describes a completed multidisciplinary performance research and creation residency project titled "Queer Deities in Migration."
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Get matched →Queer Deities in Migration is a multidisciplinary performance research and creation project curated by Georgian artists Giorgi Papalashvili, Uta Bekaia, and Dato Koridze. It explores the relationships between queer identity, migration, cultural memory, and the mythological heritage of the Caucasus. The project investigates the possibilities of art to shape alternative narratives of identity, belonging, and displacement through performing arts, visual practices, costume and mask construction, and the re-elaboration of ancestral rituals. The research centers on a dialogue between the contemporary experiences of seven queer migrants and seven ancient gender-fluid deities from Caucasian mythological tradition.
The project begins with a reflection on the marginalization, discrimination, and forced migration affecting LGBTQIA+ communities in the Caucasian area, linking these issues to a cultural and symbolic heritage where gender fluidity has historically been represented through divine figures and mythological archetypes. This relationship between past and present allows for a re-reading of queer identities not as foreign elements to their cultures of origin, but as expressions rooted in their oldest traditions. The artistic research develops around the possibility of reappropriating a cultural and mythological imaginary, transforming it into a contemporary tool for self-representation and self-determination.
Individual stories of those involved intertwine with those of the deities, creating new hybrid figures where biography, memory, myth, and invention overlap. Costumes, masks, gestures, and ritual actions play a central role in the creative process, not only as scenic elements but as devices through which the body can traverse and transform identities, experiment with new forms of presence, and make visible experiences often excluded from dominant narratives. The creative process integrated visual, corporal, and ritual elements, with particular attention to the capacity of objects, clothing, and masks to become narrative and transformative tools. The research valued the artistic process itself as a space for collective elaboration, confrontation, and the production of new meanings.
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From August 24 to September 13, 2026, BASE Milano hosted the artistic collective, composed of Giorgi Papalashvili, Giorgi Megreshvili, David Koridze, Uta Pata Bekaia, and Ismail Pasha-Sade. The residency period served as a phase of research development and deepening, offering a dedicated context for experimentation and the construction of a performative language capable of integrating different artistic practices and sensibilities. The hospitality at BASE Milano is part of the organization's broader commitment to supporting international artistic mobility, interdisciplinary research, and cultural practices that question contemporary social transformations. The residency was an opportunity to welcome and value artistic perspectives from different geographical and cultural contexts, contributing to the circulation of languages and narratives that address central issues in contemporary debate, such as the right to self-determination, freedom of expression, the plurality of identities, and the relationship between cultural belonging and migratory experience.
On September 12, 2026, the research path culminated in a public presentation as part of FAROUT Live Arts Festival, the contemporary performing arts festival promoted by BASE Milano. This presentation allowed for sharing the results of the experimentation developed during the residency with the public, placing the project within an international programming context focused on exploring new artistic languages and critical reflection on the present.
The research was supported by the European Commission and the Goethe-Institut.