The first fresco is inside St. George’s Church in Sujuna, a village in western Georgia. The church dates from the 19th century. The strange scene can be found on the lower part of the west wall, close to the entrance.

It shows the Last Judgment. Angels and demons surround people who are being sent into Hell. Among them is a very familiar face. It is Lenin.

He is shown in the flames with other sinners. Three angels appear to be sending him towards damnation. Unlike the other people in the scene, Lenin is easy to identify.

The fresco was painted in the 1990s, soon after Georgia became independent. Icon painter Davit Khidasheli was one of the artists who worked on the church. He later explained why Lenin was included.

For Khidasheli, Lenin represented godlessness. The Soviet system had attacked religion, killed clergy, and taken church property. Lenin therefore became a symbol of the atheist Soviet state.

A second version can be found in the Cathedral in Rustavi. The fresco is almost the same as the one in Sujuna. But there is one major difference. This time, Stalin is in Hell too.

The scene is on the west wall, above the main entrance. Lenin and Stalin appear together among the damned. The painting was made by young icon painters, including Davit Khidasheli. Khidasheli said that the idea came from the artists themselves. The cathedral’s priest had not agreed on every person shown in the scene.

A parishioner noticed Stalin while the fresco was being painted. She reportedly begged the artists not to include him. They partly accepted her request. Stalin’s face was changed, but his famous moustache still makes him recognizable.

Two Lenins, one message

The two frescoes are not medieval images. They are modern works from the years after Soviet rule ended. Their message is very clear.

Lenin once stood in public places as a symbol of Soviet power. In these Georgian churches, he has been placed at the opposite end of the story. He is no longer the leader of a revolution. He is a sinner in Hell.