A roadmap to follow for the artistic swimming competition during the Paris Olympics:
—Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi, China: The 27-year-old twins dominated at this year's world championships in Doha, Qatar, and they'll be among the gold-medal favorites in Paris.
—Bill May, United States: At age 45, the six-time world championship medalist was hoping to finally realize his dream of competing at the Olympics but Saturday was not named to the US team that will be competing in Paris. The USA roster includes: Anita Alvarez, Daniella Ramirez, Megumi Field, Jamie Czarkowski, Jacklyn Luu, Audrey Kwon, Keana Hunter, Ruby Remati, and Calista Liu serving as Olympic alternate.
—Russia Stays Home: After sweeping the gold medals at six straight Olympics, Russia didn't take part in the last three world championships and won't be at the Paris Games either because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. For the first time since 1996, a country other than Russia will claim Olympic gold.
—Men Are Welcome: Men have competed for decades in the lower levels of the sport formerly known as synchronized swimming, but this will be the first time they’ve been allowed at the Olympic pool. They can compete only in the team event, not duet, with a limit of two men on the eight-member squads.
—Rising Powers: China appears most likely to fill the Russian void at the top of the medal table after winning seven of 11 events at this year’s worlds in Doha, Qatar, with Japan and Spain also in the mix. The U.S. earned a spot in both events after failing to qualify for the team competition in Tokyo.
The artistic swimming competition is being held over five days at the new Paris Aquatics Centre. It begins Aug. 5 and concludes Aug. 10, with an off day on Aug. 8.
—Duet: Svetlana Kolesnichenko and Svetlana Romashina, Russian Olympic Committee.
—Team: Russian Olympic Committee.
AP Summer Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games
FILE - Gold medalists China's Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi takes part in the Free Routine segment of the Artistic Swimming Women's Duet competition at the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, Saturday, Oct. 7, 2023. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)
FILE - Bill May, front, leads the United States team out to compete in the team acrobatic of artistic swimming at the World Swimming Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, Saturday, July 15, 2023. (AP Photo/Nick Didlick, File)
FILE - Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi, of China, compete in the women's duet technical final of artistic swimming at the World Aquatics Championships in Doha, Qatar, Monday, Feb. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)
MOSCOW (AP) — Zurab Tsereteli, a prominent Georgian-Russian sculptor known for colossal, often controversial, monuments, died early on Tuesday at 92.
His assistant Sergei Shagulashvili told Russia’s state news agency Tass that Tsereteli suffered cardiac arrest.
Tsereteli was born on January 4, 1934, in Georgia, which was part of the Soviet Union at the time, in the capital Tbilisi.
In the 1970s, Tsereteli became an art director with the Soviet Foreign Ministry, traveling the world and decorating Soviet embassies. In between, he worked on Mikhail Gorbachev’s summer house in Abkhazia.
“I don’t know why they chose me,” he said in a 2013 interview. “But I went through a good school - maybe that’s why. A school that synthesised architecture and monumental art! I had good teachers.”
In 1989, a monument designed by Tsereteli was erected in London. In 1990, another one was unveiled in front of the United Nations headquarters in New York.
After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Tsereteli moved to Moscow and built a rapport with then-mayor Yuri Luzhkov. The relationship guaranteed him regular and lucrative commissions. He designed several squares and two metro stations in central Moscow and put up a dozen massive monuments around the city.
Tsereteli’s distinctive style prompted much criticism over the years, both in Russia and abroad. Critics argued his pieces were too colossal and didn’t fit in the city's architecture.
One of his most controversial monuments was in 1997 when a 98-meter-tall Peter the Great standing on a disproportionally small ship was erected a block away from the Kremlin, prompting protests from Muscovites.
Tsereteli tried to put up a similar monument of Christopher Columbus in New York. Russian media reported in 1997 that current U.S. President Donald Trump supported his plans at the time, but city authorities rejected them. After being turned down by Columbus, Ohio and Miami as well, the statue found a taker in Puerto Rico.
Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2003 awarded Tsereteli Russian citizenship “for special services to the Russian Federation.”
In 2010, Luzhkov was dismissed as Moscow mayor. The new city administration preferred Western architects to work on ambitious urban projects, and Tsereteli was shifted to the sidelines.
However, Tsereteli remained president of the Russian Academy of Arts and director of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art, which he founded in 1999.
His legacy includes some 5,000 pieces in Russia, Georgia and several other countries.
FILE - Georgian and Russian sculptor Zurab Tsereteli speaks at the opening of a series of busts of Soviet leaders that he created in Moscow, Russia, on Sept. 22, 2017. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)
FILE - Georgian and Russian sculptor Zurab Tsereteli poses during the opening ceremony of the 41st Moscow International Film Festival in Moscow, Russia, on April 18, 2019. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin, File)
