COSTUMES AND COLLAPSE: Leah Feldman, Almagul Menlibayeva,  Vladislav Sludskiy, “Costumes and Collapse in the Kazakh Art Scene”, Panel Discussion, June 22, 2023, 7:00 PM

This panel discussion delves into the role of costumes in the Kazakh art scene from the 1990s to the present, featuring a presentation and discussion of the work of Almagul Menlibayeva and Kyzyl Traktor, moderated by Professor Leah Feldman. The panel discussion will look at the role of the costumes in articulating the themes of ecological destruction in the region, brought upon by Soviet industrialisation, and the recovery/reimagination of legacies of nomadic culture and shamanism. Together with the curator Vladislav Sludskiy and the artist Almagul Menlibayeva we will explore how artistic costumes have played an integral role in shaping and redefining the artistic landscape of Kazakhstan and visions of selfhood, negotiating indigenous traditions between imperial collapse and national formation.

Panel Discussion will take place at Pickle Bar. Free admission.
No registration is required.
Language: English.

Doors open at 7:00 PM.
Panel Discussion starts at 7:30 PM.

Almagul Menlibayeva, an interdisciplinary artist, works between Germany and Kazakhstan. Her works delve into the imperative need for critical explorations of Central Asia before and after Soviet modernity. She explores themes such as social, economic, and political decolonization, the reimagining of gender, environmental degradation, Eurasian nomadic cultures, and transformations in post-Soviet Central Asia. Furthermore, Menlibayeva delves into indigenous cosmologies and mythologies.

Vladislav Sladskiy is an international curator and art consultant whose work centers around African and Qazaqstani Contemporary Art, as well as Chinese Avant-Garde. He co-curated a Kyzyl Tractor exhibition at MANA Contemporary as part of Asia Contemporary Art Week New York in 2018. 

Leah Feldman is Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at University of Chicago working the formation and collapse of the Soviet Empire from the vantage of the Caucasus and Central Asia.

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