From the Red Star to the Blue Dome
Art and Architecture in Central Asia
By Haupt & Binder

 With this exhibition in the ifa Gallery Berlin, the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (Institute for Foreign Relations) continues its series "Islamic Worlds". This includes the show "Love Affairs", which we reported on in August 2003.

 The focus of the exhibition "From the Red Star to the Blue Dome" is on artists who are dealing with "issues of the new religiousness and re-Islamization of society and their effects on people's lives" (from the press release). In installations, photographs, and videos, the artists address principally the relationship of modern life to tradition and the role of women. They pursue autobiographically the roots of their origins and, in new and contemporary ways, make the rituals of shamanism, other religions, and pre-Islamic cults their own. They sarcastically satirize the bogeyman image spread by western media.

 In addition, the exhibition encompasses a documentation of about 50 contemporary architecture projects in Central Asia. They clearly draw to mind the old Islamic traditions and the associated search for identity, proving that such already existed, even during the era where these countries were part of the Soviet Union.

 Artists:

Said Atabekov

Marina Lyubaskina

Galim Madanov & Zauresh Terekbay

Yerbossyn Meldibekov

Almagul Menlibaeva

Naomi Tereza Salomon

ZITABL - Zitta Sultanbaeva & Ablikim Akmullaev

Elena & Victor Vorobyev
 

 Architect:

Nikolai Scharski

Haupt & Binder
Gerhard Haupt and Pat Binder. Publishers of Universes in Universe - Worlds of Art; co-publishers and editors-in-chief of Nafas Art Magazine. Based in Berlin, Germany.

print version  |  send this article