Iliko Sukhishvili

Ilia "Iliko" Ilias dze Sukhishvili (; 4 April 1907 – 24 March 1985) was a Georgian dancer and choreographer who, together with his wife Nino Ramishvili, founded the Georgian State Dance Company (today the Sukhishvili Georgian National Ballet) in 1945. A People's Artist of the USSR, he served as the ensemble's principal dancer and artistic director for the rest of his life and is regarded as one of the founders of Georgian stage folk dance.

Early life and career Sukhishvili was born on 4 April 1907 in the village of Mejvriskhevi, near Gori in what was then the Tiflis Governorate of the Russian Empire. In the early 1930s he further studied in Moscow, working at the Bolshoi Theatre as an assistant to the ballet-master Kasian Goleizovsky. Honored Artist of the Georgian SSR (1943) People's Artist of the Georgian SSR (1948) Stalin Prize, First Class (1949) People's Artist of the USSR (1958) Order of Lenin (1981) Shota Rustaveli State Prize of the Georgian SSR (1973) Honorary Citizen of Tbilisi (1981)