Fine arts in Kyrgyzstan
The Daughter of Soviet Kirgizia by Semen Chuikov
Those who have been checking out my postcards for any length will probably have worked out that I have a fascination with the calendar. One of my pet sayings is: “Everyday is a special day … for someone” and I collect what one of friends once called “crazy days”. Today is one of those days: Inspire your heart with Art Day.
I have absolutely no idea where this day comes from … who thought of it or what their aim was, (although I suppose that is fairly obvious if you think about it).
From ancient times it has been used to tell a story. It can inspire us and can change our way of looking at the world. It is all around us … but many people take little notice of it. If you ask most people what they understand by the word “Art”, most of them would talk about paintings, but it is far more than that.
Art is all around us. There is art in the architecture in our villages, towns and cities; gardens and city streets have statues and floral displays; we walk past graffiti on walls and fail to see the art in it not to mention the thousands of advertisements we see every day.
We don’t even have to step into a gallery.
In Kyrgyzstan, the emphasis tends on be on what is called here the “applied arts“, or traditional crafts. That’s understandable because they constitute such a major factor in traditional nomadic culture of the people. Performing arts – especially traditional music and performances by manaschis – also receive a lot of attention. This emphasis, however, has often led another rich vein opf culture often being overlooked – the Fine Arts.
The Arts were heavily subsidized in the Soviet period and there was wide access to the various facilities available for artistic and self expression. With the fall of the Soviet Union, and the resulting economic downturn, cultural institutions were amongst the first victims of the need to find economies. Cultural centres, museums, galleries and clubs in villages went into decline and have, in many cases, ceased to function … although, in Bishkek at least, some private galleries have now opened.
Monumental artwork (statues, monuments, etc.), with their echoes of National Pride and Soviet grandeur, and public art (such as murals – and even rural bus-stops) can cause the traveler to stop and admire the imagination and handiwork of the artist. There are also interesting examples of architecture, especially as the town planners and architects have been released from the plain, functional, style which dominated much of the building which took place in the Soviet period.
In some ways, the Fine Arts may well be alien to the nomadic traditions of the Kyrgyz People. In his novel Jamilla, Chinghiz Aitmatov surprises the reader with a narrator who is a young boy – marked out because of his drawing skills – which have tragic and far reaching consequences for the main characters in the story.
Of course, some of the neglect that the fine arts have suffered may have been due in part to the nominal allegiance to Islam – which is usually associated with a prohibition on the depiction of people and animals.
The Soviet system tried to recognize artistic skill. There were colleges and institutes for developing the talents of young people and the Artists Union provided support for many whose talents were recognized by the authorities. The Artists Union not only had its own gallery, it also built a complex of studios for rent in the southern suburbs of Bishkek – The Artists City – but although most have now been sold to the tenants, it still houses a thriving community and it is possible to visit, to meet the artists, see (and buy) examples of their work. The complex also has an exhibition hall which hosts occasional exhibitions. The collapse of the Soviet Union, and the subsequent disappearance of state funding for supporting the arts led to a period of “stagnation” in the field of contemporary art. This period which drew to a close with three major exhibitions, (“Parallel City”, “Labyrinths” and “Plus-Minus”), held at the Museum of Fine Arts, in the period 1997-9.
Interestingly, there are a number of foreign born artists that have chosen to live and work in Kyrgyzstan – and have been received recognition in their adopted home with official awards and titles
Much of the artwork on sale on the streets and in galleries feature landscapes, (many produced as copies in studios), and traditional themes such as a Jigid showing off his horse riding skills. Perhaps it is not surprising that most Kyrgyz artists like painting landscapes – faced with the variety of scenery, light and colour available all around them. Another recurring theme is scenes taken from everyday life whether it be in a yurt or a street scene, a family gathering or musicians playing.
Perhaps more surprising is the tendency for painting portraits, given the supposed Islamic prohibition against depicting the human form.
As well as the general tendency towards realism, there are examples demonstrating the influences of different schools such as surrealism, impressionism and cubism. Paintings tend to be colourful and, (even when depicting landscapes or people), demonstrate more interpretation, atmosphere and feeling than realism. Inspiration is often drawn from traditional motifs or petroglyphs, especially in some of the more abstract works.
In recent years there have been other major, imaginative exhibitions, such as the two “Art of The Silk Road” exhibitions in 2001 and 2002. The Soros Foundation and United Nations have also sponsored exhibitions and produced books illustrating many different forms of Fine Art, such as: painting, sculpture, ceramics, jewellery, collage, drawing, photography, animation, children’s artwork and, of course, examples of applied art (or traditional craftwork). There have also been a number of travelling exhibitions of Kyrgyz and Central Asian artwork which have visited Europe (notably in Berlin, Geneva and St Petersburg).
Bishkek