Almagul Menlibayeva
©Almagul Menlibayeva
° 1969
Born in Almaty (KZ), lives in Berlin (DE).
Almagul Menlibayeva (°1969) was born in Almaty (Kazakhstan). Trained as a painter, Menlibayeva exhibited with ‘Zelyonyi triugolok’ (Green Triangle), a group of young artists in Almaty in the late eighties. In the nineties the burgeoning Kazakh art market created a reasonably high demand for her paintings. Yet Menlibayeva turned to performance and video in the first years of the new millennium. An early example is the action Vechnaya nevesta (‘Eternal Bride’, 2002), for which she roamed the streets and bazaars of Almaty dressed in the long white gown and veil of a Soviet bride. This indicates her strong interest in the female experience and the quest for emancipatory modernity that the USSR also stood for, despite all its cruelty and dysfunction.
Menlibayeva has been called a ‘punk-shaman’, and it is true that her more recent works very consciously combine exotic imagery with the latest tendencies in digital technology and electronic music. Her strategy underlines many of the gaps and disconnections that become visible in Central Asia (in her case Kazakhstan) as the region now moves ‘forward’ and ‘backward’ simultaneously: towards greater integration into the globalised political economy as providers of natural resources and military bases for both Russia and the US, but also towards parochial and paternalistic inertia in domestic politics, where ex-communist rulers gain dominion again and are selling the promise of ‘stability’ to their populations and international patrons.
Media
>Interview Almagul Menlibayeva (2010)
>picture of the artist
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Headcharge Installation, 2007.Installation, 00:12:00 min.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Exodus, 2009.Video, video, flatscreen, 00:11:00.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Portrait of my Daughter 2, 2010.Photography, lambda print, alu di-bond, 80.2 x 53.5 x 2.3 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Portrait of my Daughter I, 2010.Photography, lambda print, alu di-bond, 80.2 x 53.5 x 2.3 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Dior and Boss, 2010.Photography, lambda print, alu di-bond, 53.5 x 80.2 x 2.3 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Dior Salome, 2010.Photography, lambda print, alu di-bond, 53.5 x 80.2 x 2.3 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, My Friends, 2010.Photography, lambda print, alu di-bond, 53.5 x 80.2 x 2.3 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, The Observer, 2010.Photography, cibachrome, 96.5 x 127 x 5.5 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Forever Umai, 2010.Photography, cibachrome, 96.5 x 127 x 5.5 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Tengri Boy, 2010.Photography, cibachrome, 96.5 x 127 x 5.5 cm.
>Almagul Menlibayeva, Steppen Police, 2010.Photography, cibachrome, 127 x 183 x 8.5 cm.
Exhibitions & Ensembles
> Exhibition: EXTRA MUROS: Geel – Middle Gate II – The Story of Dymphna. 15 September 2018 - 04 November 2018.
> Exhibition: LATT: Europe at Large #6 Rustam Khalfin & Almagul Menlibayeva. 16 July 2010 - 29 August 2010.
> Exhibition: The Collection. 28 April 2017 - 31 December 2021.
> Exhibition: Urgent Conversations Athens - Antwerp. 31 October 2016 - 05 February 2017.
> Exhibition: Visite Roeselare – The Green Line. 05 May 2016 - 19 June 2016.
> Exhibition: When Faith Moves Mountains. 17 July 2022 - 09 October 2022.
> Exhibition: Worth Fighting For. 14 November 2022 - 14 December 2022.
> Ensemble: Audiodescriptie - De Collectie.
> Ensemble: CENTRAL ASIA.
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> Ensemble: Eerste verdieping | First Floor.
> Ensemble: EUROPE AT LARGE.
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> Ensemble: Landscape.
> Ensemble: Middle Gate.
> Ensemble: MIGRATIE | MIGRATION.
> Ensemble: multipolair.
> Ensemble: NUCLEUS.
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> Ensemble: Punk Shamanism.
> Ensemble: The Collection.
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> Ensemble: The Space of Grounded Imagination.
> Ensemble: Worth Fighting For.