24 Mar - 15 Apr 16
Azerbaijan exists at the crossroads of Europe and Asia. It has long been a critical point of cultural exchange and cross-cultivation. From ancient civilizations, seen through the cave drawings of Gobustan, the Christian Albanian temples of the first century AD and the first Turkic settlements of Atilla's warriors, to rich Islamic tradition, Sufi poetry, Oriental music, architecture and crafts, and finally to Russian industrialism and the Soviet modernity, Azerbaijani heritage is highly diverse and fascinatingly complex. Maintaining close relations to its neighbours, Azerbaijani people have internalised the improvisations brought on by time and identify in equal measure with an array of seemingly distinct cultural constructs.
Baku is the perfect common ground for the arts from the region commonly referred to as the Caucasus and Central Asia. Similarities in religion, language and, more recently, the common Soviet past, between the various nationalities and country-states populating the region, have been further reinforced by the dramatic socio-economic change of the last twenty years. Connecting to global markets and influences for the first time in seventy years, artists were among the first to react and subsequently negotiate and reflect this transition in their works.
YARAT's Permanent Collection is presented for the first time with the opening of its new space. The first exhibition of the collection will bring together seminal works across media that are historically connected to the culture of Azerbaijan and the neighbouring region and the potent sense of identity catalysed by exposure to radical socio-political changes of the recent decades. Some artists reference the symbolism of ancient traditions; some find nostalgia in transitory moments of the everyday; some question the infallibility of existing narratives, while others project quasi-utopian optimism for a better future. Nevertheless, all works shown in this exhibition are explorations into what it means to live today and construct, block by block, the new histories of tomorrow.
Aida Mahmudova's epic seascape overlooks the Caspian Sea, remaining in constant conversation with the dominant element of the centre's environment. The canvas, executed in mixed media, is evocative of the artists home, which can be, like the Sea itself, both welcoming and hostile. Sanan Aleskerov's Transparency of Simplicity (2013) series further delineates the locale, through close ups on seemingly insignificant and transient markers of landscape, such as a cellophane curtain blowing in the wind (Blue Wind).
Rashad Babayev's works, Dervish (2014) and Poetic Sculpture (2014), pay homage to religious and literary roots forming the culture of the region today. Faig Ahmed's Threads (2012) and Rashad Alakbarov's Shebeke (2012) decompose traditional crafts into their elements and repurpose their semiology to give them a new voice.
Historical narratives are evoked in Erbossyn Meldibekov's Gattamelata in the Hide of Genghis Khan (1999), referencing the traditional image of the Central Asian Steppe, yet stripping it of its identity. The desire to be marked in history through monumentality, so familiar to the Soviet psyche and wittily refused in this seminal work, is juxtaposed with the unfailing desire to be a part of history explored in the work of Taus Makhacheva, Let Me Be Part of a Narrative (2012). Her three-channel video explores the way traditional forms of public showcase change over time, are reintroduced through media and in turn shape local identity. Social problems and inequalities reinforced through generations are addressed in Sitara Ibrahimova's and Ilkin Huseynov's photographic series, which, like Makhacheva, portrays a local case that stands for more general concerns.
Other artists, such as Niyaz Najafov, Ramal Kazim and young filmmakers Zamir Suleymanov and Emin Azizbeyli, direct their gaze inwards and paint an introverted view of a contemporary personality, portraying anxiety associated with the convergence of the old and the new, as well as the routine of everyday life. The idiosyncratic routines of the post-perestroika generation is further addressed in Olga Chernysheva's Screen series, in which repetitive activity shapes local philosophy. Repetition takes a different shape in Farid Rasulov's Inertia (2007) as the butcher cuts through meat recorded backwards, the artist questions our perceptions and gives a seemingly commonplace occurrence an existential edge.
Progress associated with capitalism, globalised imagery and accelerated construction, tends to erase memories of the vernacular in its wake. Orkhan Huseynov, in his multi-channel video work, Atelier Sovetsky (2014), presents a nostalgic portrait of stereotypical dwellers of a now-gentrified district of Baku and their often questionable lifestyle.
Nostalgia is felt even more strongly in Nevin Aladag's Five Stone Game (2009-2012) photographic series depicting actions of a childhood game commonly shared across the Anatolian and Central Asian region. The work accentuates the ability of folklore carried through generations to enter the collective unconscious and transcend borders.
Koka Ramishvili's works offer a take on different imagery able to transcend all barriers, namely that of commodification and advertising. His discreet, almost miniature videos depict anonymous contemporary ideals identified through consumption.
Nilbar Gures highlights the absurdity inherent in capitalist dreams by contrasting seemingly unchartered and almost forgotten environments with a high-fashion aesthetic.
Idris Khan's encompassing three-channel video installation, Lying in Wait (2009), concludes the exhibition. It proposes a way to interact with knowledge as the dancer navigates endless rows of books through choreographed abstracted movements. Perhaps, we are all just lying in wait for the contemporary times to resolve themselves, so we can call our actions history.
Suad Garayeva