Sauda Ismailova’s films take a star turn in Documenta and Venice – ARTnews.com

This year marks one of the rare times when the two most frequent art fairs in the world, the Venice Biennale in Italy and the Documenta in Kassel, Germany, coincide. There are more than 200 artists in the former and many, many more artists in the second. (It’s hard to verify the exact numbers for Documenta, which grew into the thousands as a succession of select groups and individuals brought more and more artists to join them.)

Only one person made the initial artist lists for both exhibitions: Sauda Ismayilova, a filmmaker whose work is distinguished from the people of her native Uzbekistan by her role in Sufism and deeply rooted in reality.

In Ismayilova’s films, unfolding in long shots, viewers watch ancient fairy tales and religious rituals begin. Often time consuming as her camera surfs over vacant mountainous landscapes; The pace does not rush in a way reminiscent of the speculative style of feature films by Apichatpong Werasethakul and Ho Hsiao Hsien, specialists in what is sometimes called slow cinema.

Biennials are places where people quickly view art, partly out of necessity – there is plenty of artwork on display to give most things a proper look. (This is particularly the case at Documenta, which is currently hosting its largest release to date.) But against all odds, Ismailova’s slow art has stood out. It highlights societies in post-Soviet Central Asia, and provides a perspective rarely seen in Western art spaces. Most importantly, the work is hypnotic – it entraps viewers in its calm rhythms, which sometimes feel as if they are set to the same rhythm of life itself.

“It’s probably about breathing,” Ismayilova said of her editing style, speaking on a WhatsApp phone call in July. “I think if we pay attention to our breathing, we think – we meditate on the outside and then maybe we think in. I think that by meditating, you can be more true to reality.”

She felt as if Ismayilova was reminding herself to breathe during a stormy summer. Ismayilova, who splits her time between Tashkent and Paris, was speaking from Kassel, facilitating a group of her own creation consisting of artists from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. The group named DAVRA was a response to the concept of the curators, the Indonesian Ruangrupa Group, which focused on artist groups.

While we were talking, Ismayilova was preparing to perform a work called precious drops, which she created together with Intizor Otaniyozova, who was invited to sing the Uyghur song. When Entezor tweeted, she poured the tea from 40 cups into one and then drank it. The performance was dense with hints. Forty, a recurring number in the work of DAVRA, is a reference to 40 days chila A period in Islam when believers spend time alone in religious meditation, and into the decade of a woman’s life that is believed in Central Asia to bring prosperity. Tea was a reference to tea ceremonies, led by young women in Central Asia with the aim of offering guidance when marrying, and to A water crisis is currently affecting the region.

Later in the month, Tokshan Karatay sang Patterns from the past, a piece in which traditional Kazakh patterns have been transformed into musical notations and then played near wooden figures that somehow share aesthetic affinities, from the artist’s point of view. Both the events of Karatai and Otaniyozova appeared in the context of a new work by Ismailova that was dealt with Sheltanor converts.

The different nationalities of these artists, and their vastly different approaches, was part of Ismailova’s view – she wanted to “refreeze” the Central Asian scene, as she put it. But she wanted the people of Central Asia to unite themselves.

“After the collapse of the Soviet Union, in the art and film scene, we were connected through festivals, events or exhibitions that take place outside Central Asia, most of the time in the West or in Russia,” she added. “We talk to each other, and I think it’s very important, if you think about our future.”

Despite the fact that Ismailova’s films have a minimal amount of dialogue on the screen, a similar spirit guides her work – and, to some extent, her life.

Born in Tashkent in 1981, Ismayilova was well acquainted with film early on because her father was a cinematographer in films made within the Uzbek cinema system. But it was her grandmother, with whom she shared a room for 21 years, who made the biggest mark. Born to clergy in Kazakhstan, Ismayilova said, her grandmother gave “stories transmitted from a female world.” “You have inspired me.” Many of Ismailova’s films to this day remain completely devoid of male characters, although she insists that this is not on purpose.

Ismayilova eventually followed her father’s field of work, entering the Tashkent State Institute of Arts, where she studied film and television. Her education there was mainly focused on the Soviet style of filmmaking, which was forever changed by directors such as Sergei Parajanov and Andrei Tarkovsky, two of Ismailova’s favorite filmmakers, during the 1960s and 1970s. Soviet filmmakers wrested from the visions of a realistic socialist aesthetic, resulting in a more contemplative setting that touched on religious and existential concerns. In their films, psychological states are depicted not directly but more expressively, through continuous shots of landscapes and other imagined worlds resembling ours – with slight tweaks. “About the influence of these directors, I must say that I have started to feel it more in my practice over the past few years and accept it,” Ismayilova said with a laugh.

A creative breakthrough occurred in 2004 while residing across the Benetton Group in Fabrica, Italy. Made by Ismailova with Carlos Casas Aral: Fishing in an invisible sea, a documentary about the fishermen who inhabit the diminishing region of water between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. (Since Ismailova made this film, it is now almost completely dry.) Although climate change is an implicit concern in AralPeople focused Casas and Ismailova. “Aral It doesn’t talk about politics or the environment, it only talks about human survival power,” they wrote in a statement accompanying the film. This documentary – and Ismailova’s work, including her only completed film, 40 days of silence (2014) – seen at some of the world’s biggest film festivals. (She’s now working on another feature, and this month she traveled to southern Kyrgyzstan to begin filming.)

However, the art world did not notice her until 2013. That year, Ismailova’s work was shown at the Venice Biennale in the Central Asian Pavilion. the installation she was showing, zakra (2013), was an unconventional portrait of an Uzbek woman, lying in bed, remembering her nation’s past and present. Adding to the dream-like quality of the film is its presentation – the images are not projected onto a screen but a swaying piece of cloth as the air within the space pushes it back and forth.

Sandra den Hammer, director of the Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam, said she chose Ismayilova as the foundation’s $30,000 prize winner this year because of works such as zakrawhich was praised for its “witching” ability to have as much impact in the single-screen version as it does in installation.

“The narration in her work is not an A-to-B plot,” said Den Hammer. “There is this fluidity in her transition from history to memories to rituals to spiritual forces.”

You can say the same about Ismailova’s current work at the Venice Biennale, shilahuna (2022), a video installation filmed in underground chambers built near the cemeteries of the saints in Tashkent. At its core, the film is a retelling of the Central Asian version of Cinderella – but Ismailova’s translation is so abstract, she wouldn’t even bother to explain it. “The main elements are there,” she said. “But if you look at it more carefully, it’s way more animalistic.” In reading Ismailova, the heroine is liberated not by marriage but by her own choices.

“I was very interested in the fact that the rituals are still in place and the story is still being told,” Ismayilova continued. “The story didn’t just become an anecdote for us.”

In other words, in Ismailova’s world, cultural memory almost never dies. This is playing in her five life (2020) Ismayilova’s film produced for the Asian Film Archive. In 13 minutes, Ismayilova charts the progress of women in her homeland over the past century – from being shattered by patriarchy to liberation under communism to sexual realization during perestroika – using images culled from Uzbek films. her five life It begins with grainy shots of women being thrown down stairs during the Silent Era and ends with pictures borrowed from Ismailova. 40 days of silence.

It is an example of how Ismailova fights to keep history alive, bringing it together for viewers in unusual ways. She did it literally – she has old versions of Uzbek films and related ephemera – but she also did it on a metaphorical level by relaying timelines.

“It is important for me to say that these traditions and knowledge are not limited to the past,” she said. “It can be translated to our contemporary lives, as well as building a possible future. It transcends time.”