Saule Suleimenova in Conversation on Art, Identity & Decolonial Image
In our debut episode, we are joined by Kazakh multidisciplinary artist Saule Suleimenova for a conversation on art, identity, and the decolonial image in Central Asia.
From the outset, Suleimenova has worked with archival photographs and historical materials, seeking to articulate a truthful image of Kazakhstan and its people. Reflecting on her early 'Kazakh chronicle' series, she describes turning to archival imagery as a response to the idealized aesthetics of post-Soviet socialist realism: “They are documents of their time, and they don’t lie”.
A central thread of the conversation explores the challenge of representing identity without falling into either romanticization or distortion. Suleimenova speaks about her ongoing pursuit of balance between beauty and truth, emphasizing that each work or series reopens the same question: how to show things as they are.
The discussion also addresses the lasting impact of colonial and Soviet legacies. Suleimenova describes a fractured sense of cultural self-worth and the disruption of historical continuity across the region, particularly in nomadic societies. Through her practice, she navigates and reconstructs these layered histories, often working through themes of trauma, memory, and collective experience.
Asked about the notion of “another Kazakhness”, beyond clichés and official aesthetics, Suleimenova gestures toward “an epic sense of life” inherent to her culture. Perhaps it is “the great steppe”, she suggests, that “belongs to us” and shapes this sensibility. “When people ask me if I have a political stance on something, I say: I have feelings, I have a deep, terrible pain, and I want to convey it, to share it, because I think I am not the only one who feels this pain. I think it’s something that unites all of us”, she says. For her, everything is rooted in a fundamental emotion, a primary feeling of love. “I love our people very much - they are wonderful as they are”. Moments of trauma, she notes, reveal the character of the people with particular clarity. The Jeltoqsan protests, she recounts, exemplify this energy: Kazakh youth, largely from villages, spontaneously took to the streets in terrible cold, in frost, thousands in number. “It was epic energy. It reflects Kazakhness very well”.
Her use of plastic, linked conceptually to traditional patchwork forms, becomes a way of engaging with what is discarded, overlooked, or hidden. In this context, decolonization becomes about acceptance: embracing the entirety of one’s history, including its residues.
Expanding beyond national frameworks, the conversation touches on a shared cultural code across Central Asia. Reflecting on her participation in the Bukhara Biennial, Suleimenova describes the region as a space of intersections for the past and present, youth and age, language and tradition, held together by a unifying sense of connection.
We are happy to introduce this new format in our program through a series of conversations, bringing together artists, curators, and cultural practitioners from the Caucasus and Central Asia.
Given the cultural diversity and historical complexity of the region we work with, some of our conversations will take place in languages that are most natural to our speakers. At the same time, to ensure accessibility for our audience, each episode will be accompanied by subtitled video formats available on our YouTube channel [https://www.youtube.com/@ForaGallery].
Read more on this conversation at fora-gallery.com [https://www.fora-gallery.com/news]
Check available works by the artist on artsy.net [https://www.artsy.net/partner/fora-gallery]
