The Kyrgyz / Kazakh Prints!
I am excited to introduce the Kyrgyz / Kazakh prints! Here is how the work came about.
This is The Plan:
–> Rent a room in Kyrgyzstan, set up a studio, make art. <–
I arrived at 4am, couldn’t sleep on the plane, had been traveling for 24 hours. The taxi driver situation at the Bishkek airport was intense. On the ride from the airport to the city, it became apparent that this was my favorite place that I had ever been. My friend asked me what it looked like, I told him it looked exactly like this:
“it looked exactly like this” and Bishkek
I had arrived with a pretty good idea of the direction I wanted to work in. For the first few weeks, to my dismay, I ended up dismantling my idea piece by piece, until there was pretty much nothing left.
“wrong direction”
I made some sort of mistake with my visa, and needed to not be in Kyrgyzstan for a few weeks, so I decided to go to Kazakhstan and make a “mobile studio”.
Difficulties with every day life. Everything was hard! This was expected, this was what I was there for… but normal things that would take 15 minutes ended up taking two days?! This happened again and again. It was amazing. The grocery store. How to even find it! Frequently it was impressively well hidden. How to buy something that resembled yoghurt (there were many imposters!) How to take the bus in Astana (more specifically, how to get the necessary bus card. In this case, cash was forbidden.). This was a two day endeavor. Things that are shown to exist, don’t. Finally I found an automat machine. And it was broken! No one could tell me where I might find another.
Why do I love this so much?! Chaos, Confusion, Nothing is normal… This is my favorite.
Difficulties With Everyday Life and sort-of yoghurt
“Trying To Find The Train Station”
You would figure this would be straightforward. The tram ends at the train station, google maps shows the end of the tram, as well as the train station. HA! The tram ended in a weird wooded circle with dirt paths and crumbling staircases leading in various directions and no indication of where is the train station! I started down a dirt path and it seemed to be leading to weird muddy alleys and it wasn’t the train station. The crumbling stairs however, wound up and around and through more trees and over some train tracks and did end up at the train station. Somehow this filled me with joy.
the impossible-to-find bus card and Trying To Find The Train Station in Oskemen
In my roving studio arrangement, I was one day eating breakfast at a wonderful cafe I had found, where I could get eggs and toast and coffee, and sit outside even when it was rainy and cold, and they insisted to bring me a blanket… and being really quite worried that I had basically nothing art-wise. No ideas, only all the ideas I had taken apart. The familiar despair of “this time I really can’t do it!” was coming, I cannot go home empty-handed, I cannot go home with something I am not excited about. Everywhere I had gone, and all the weird situations, I had been looking and thinking and looking and thinking and trying to find SOMETHING. Then I realized that the things that had filled me with the most joy and were the most engaging, were the ridiculous struggles and mishaps, and small weird wonderful situations, and trying to make sense of what was going on.
So I had a bit of a starting point. And then it finally all began to come together.
the roving studio, and finally something
“The Tripping Stairs”
This was in my apartment building. I nearly fell down these stairs every day for a week. The top step was short and also had a slanted part to further try to topple you down. I cannot explain why I loved this so much.
“the tripping stairs” and The Tripping Stairs
“Kyzyl the Cat”
I had to make a cat rescue. It turns out that cats are good at climbing rough concrete walls?! It seems they are not so good at getting down. Cat rescue was not so easy… The obvious window didn’t open past the trash chute(?) and the one above also didn’t open.
Kyzyl / The Cat Outside The Fourth Floor Window. the cat. and the overview.
the cat is not in the overview picture because I was busy with the cat rescue and took the overview picture afterwards.
“Negotiating with a bicycle.”
I will leave this to your imagination. It was amazing.
Negotiating With A Bicycle
“And then there was hail.”
The Situation, And Then There Was Hail
Kyrgyzstan / Kazakhstan :
The architecture, landscapes, adventures, mishaps, and especially people – were all amazing. I am very excited to share the work that has come out of it.
You can see the whole series here https://laraloutrel.com/works.php?year=14