Zommer Rihard-Karl

Zommer Rihard-Karl (1866-1939), German painter and graphic artist. He was born in Munich. In 1893 he graduated from the Petersburg Imperial Academy of Art. In 1890 – 1900 he worked in Central Asia; during those years he visited Georgia for the first time (he accompanied an archeological expedition). In 1912 he settled in Tbilisi, where he worked as a teacher of drawing. At the same time he was employed in Armenia and Azerbaijan. It is known that Lado Gudiashvili, the outstanding Georgian painter was his pupil. Zommer was one of the initiators and founders of the Caucasian Society of Fine Arts in Tbilisi. He has traveled throughout almost all Georgia, doing paintings and drawings of the country’s everyday life, battle scenes, landscapes of architectural monuments (Old Tbilisi, Svanetian Woman, Dwellers of Guria, Gremi, Vendor of Apples). His paintings are preserved at private collections, State Ethnographic Museum named after I. Grishashvili and National Museum of Georgia. Among his paintings, which depict Tbilisi, should be mentioned: The Mosque of Shah-Ismail, The Metekhi Bridge and the Bazaar Scene. R. Zommer fell victim to the political repressions of the Soviet regime and died in exile, presumably, in 1939.