George Papashvily

George Papashvily and his younger brother David were the two sons of Vanno and Eamdze Papashvily, simple farmers. George Papashvily was born in the village of Kobiaantkari in the Dusheti District, Mtskheta-Mtianeti region of eastern Georgia. According to his autobiographical first book, he apprenticed as a swordmaker and ornamental leatherworker. After service as a sniper in the Russian army in World War I, he returned to Georgia. In 1921, Papashviliy fought in the Georgian Menshevik army against the Red Army invasion of Georgia, and then fled to Istanbul, Turkey, where he lived for two years. Papashvily immigrated to the United States circa 1923-1924, and lived and worked there for the rest of his life. Papashvily succeeded both as a sculptor and as an author; he was also a gifted engineer and inventor.[2]

Papashvily met Helen Waite in 1930, while she was managing a bookstore in Berkeley, California. They married in 1933. After a brief stint in New York City, George and Helen bought a farm and settled in Quakertown, Pennsylvania.[3] Together, the Papashvilys wrote several books, often based on his life experiences.[2] Their first book was Anything Can Happen, which humorously recounted Papashvily's experiences as a penniless immigrant. Originally published in a serialized format in Common Ground and Direction magazines,[4] this book was co-selected for the Book of the Month Club and was a best-seller, selling more than 600,000 copies in the U.S. and 1.5 million worldwide. It was translated into 15 foreign languages, including Georgian (in 1966). It was made into a movie in 1952, starring Jose Ferrer as George and Kim Hunter as Helen, which had a great success and awarded with a Golden Globe. Papashvily died in 1978 in Cambria, California.[1]

• Anything Can Happen (1945)
• Yes and No Stories - A Book of Georgian Folk Tales (1946)
• Dogs and People (1954)
• Thanks to Noah (1956, in Georgian: 1971)
• Home and Home Again (1973, recounting a trip they made in the 1960s back his village of birth)
• Russian Cooking (1969)

With no formal training, Papashvily began carving in 1940. He soon developed a signature style that was a combination of naive and modern. He carved directly in wood and stone, sculpting free-standing figures and bas relief. His favorite subjects came from nature: animals, flowers, and an occasional human figure.[2] Among his most famous works are:

• War's End (1946)
• Pigeons (1948, Hazleton Art League)
• Ram (1951)
• Butterfly (1952, Woodmere Art Gallery)
• Horse (1955, National Art Gallery of the Republic of Georgia)
• Animal (1957, Reading Public Museum and Art Gallery)
• Apple (1959)
• Library Bears (1966, Fox Chase Branch, Free Library of Philadelphia)
• Bear Cub with Frog (1966, West Oak Lane Branch, Free Library of Philadelphia)
• Otter (1975, Children's Literature Research Collection, Free Library of Philadelphia)

Papashvily exhibited widely in solo exhibitions and with painters who were his friends.

• List of Georgians
• List of Georgian writers
• List of sculptors
• Culture of Georgia

• Finding Aid for the George and Helen Papashvily Archives, Special Collections, Linderman Library, Lehigh University
• Dictionary of Georgian National Biography

• American Artist magazine, October, 1955.
• George Papashvily: Sculptor, a retrospective catalogue with an introduction by Charles H. Muhlenberg, Pennsylvania, 1979.