EVENTS
RE-DIRECTING: EAST. Conversations # 6: Bermet Borubaeva & Diana Ukhina
July 10, 2013 at 5 p.m.

RE-DIRECTING: EAST. Conversations
# 6: Bermet Borubaeva & Diana Ukhina, Kyrgyzstan

July 10, 2013 at 5 p.m., Laboratory building CCA
The presentations are held in English.

RE-DIRECTING: EAST Conversation # 6:
Bermet Borubaeva & Diana Ukhina
from CSW TV.


Bermet Borubaeva & Diana Ukhina: "Self-organized communities as a modus of existence of the Kyrgyzstan’s contemporary art."


In our presentation we want to talk about Contemporary art in Kyrgyzstan over the past decades. And in context of this, we want to emphasis some main points of the Art education process with the examples of schools, which we have attended in Kyrgyzstan during last 5 years.

During last twenty years the government of Kyrgyzstan has passed a number of neo-liberal reforms. Basic ideology behind this process is reduction of the government’s influence on the economic and social life to a minimum. This process is combined with patriarchal mode, which leads to the degradation of social infrastructure and influence to the instability of the political regime. After the USSR’s collapse and the time of adaptation, unstable processes of coercive regime change took place ("revolutions" in 2005 and 2010 years).During this period there were a number of self-organised, non-institutional, independent communities of artists in Kyrgyzstan and in the Central Asian region who began to work in contemporary art.

Along with contemporary art exhibitions in Almaty (Kazakhstan), where a Center for Contemporary Art is based, other exhibitions were organised in Bishkek, i.e.: «Plus-Minus», «And others ...», «The area of risk», «In the shadow of heroes» and etc. These were regional exhibitions with artists from Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. In 2005 the first Central Asia Pavilion was opened in Venice. It was the first big step into the global world of contemporary art for artists from the region. Contemporary art in that period was a field of independent, enthusiasm, and freedom; a self-studied process based on self-organisation. Every participant had an equal right to decide about art production without hard hierarchical structure. However, due to the absence of any contemporary art teaching programs in the state schools, there remains the important issue of education for artists, art-managers and curators. In 2009the first pilot project of "ArtEast" - School of Contemporary Art was initiated for students who never studied contemporary art before. This school became a source of unique experience with innovative methodology of learning and generated growth of local self-organized communities such as: Initiative group of young artists "InsideOut", which now operates as "Jon ele emes", and "StrekOOza group". They initiated a number of art events and participated in different local and international exhibitions.

In 2012, educational program Art and Production was opened by STAB (School Theory and Activism - Bishkek). The main method of the school includes theoretical research of Central Asia regional art practices and material analyses of art production on the crossing of market economy and neoliberal ideology. Now there is a question for us: how will art develop in our region? On the one hand there is the spirit of enthusiasm, and on the other total dependency on outside financial support for creation of art events and platforms.

Bermet Borubaeva was born and lives in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. She is an independent artist, art-manager, and member of the «Стрек°°за» (StrekOOza) art-group and the initiative group of young artists "InsideOut". She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science. Borubaeva graduated the "ArtEast" School of Contemporary Art in Bishkek. She took part in summer schools with art-group Cascoland Bishkek, "Mobile Architecture Kunstford Vijfhausen" in the Netherlands, "Terrain Orientation", Global ArtLab Program for young artists in New-York by CEC ArtsLink, and Moscow Curatorial Summer School "Doing Exhibitions Politically" organised by Victor Misiano and V-A-C-Foundation. Since 2009 she has taken part in various workshops and art-projects and participated in the organisation of local and international art-events: First Youth Central Asian exhibition of Contemporary Art ON/OFF, Mini-festival "Trash", "Trash II", she worked closely with Swiss artists and the Focus-Art Association "TET A TET #2" on exhibitions in Kyrgyzstan and Switzerland and on the educational program of the exhibition Lingua Franca/ Frank Tili dedicated to language, history, and politics. She worked as a curator and educational program manager. She is an author of several publications in the field of art, political science and public policy and coordinates the STAB-library. The School of Theory and Activism–Bishkek (STAB) is a Central Asian art research initiative, whose participants define art as a mechanism of social criticism and radical imagination.

Diana Ukhina is art manager and artist, member of the «СтрекООза» (StrekOOza) art group and the initiative group of young artists "InsideOut". She graduated the ArtEast’s School of Contemporary Art in Bishkek; Summer school with Cascoland (Dutch artistic group), Bishkek; Summer school of contemporary art for young artists and intellectuals "Terrain Orientation", Dushanbe; Curatorial Summer School at ArtEast, Bishkek, and "ClimaSight" workshop, Munich. Over the last four years she participated in the organization of art projects: Summer school of the documentary photography, video and animation "Investigate Real Life"; Eco-festival "Trash II" with international festival "Make a Forest"; First Young Central Asian exhibition of Contemporary Art ON/OFF, Mini-festival "Trash" - (ecological festival). She was a co-curator and manager of the educational program of the exhibition Lingua Franca / Frank Tili – an exhibition about language, history and politics organized by the art group StrekOOza. She collaborated with curatorial team of the first exhibition of the Central Asia Pavilion at the Venice Biennale which was extensively presented in Central Asia. Ukhina is a project coordinator of STAB, School of Theory and Activism – Bishkek, which is Central Asian art research initiative, Its participants determine art as a mechanism of social critic and radical imagination. She lives in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.
 

 

 





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