"In the arms of Almaty"

The project is supported by the Department of Culture of the southern capital and is called “In the arms of Almaty”.

The exhibition presents 28 paintings dedicated to the city, its architecture, streets and those special conditions that arise at different times of the year and different hours of the day. In the plots and landscapes of Rashid Kulbatyrov, retro-Almaty is quiet, green, almost homely, filled with a special atmosphere and signs of urban life, which are gradually becoming a thing of the past today. This is a city of memory, a city of childhood and youth, a city that we still have time to recognize on his canvases. On the canvases of the master is not just a landscape, but a sense of loss - sometimes barely perceptible, but physically tangible. The artist seems to stop the moment, keeping on canvas that urban space, which is rapidly changing right before our eyes. Centuries-old oaks disappear, which until recently gave a thick coolness and a sense of reliability; one after another, slender poplars, stretching for centuries to the Almaty sky, go under the axe. The aryks, through which the clear water has recently run, fall silent – they are buried, hidden under concrete, turning the living arteries of the city into faceless elements of the urban infrastructure. Favorite courtyards disappear, where neighbors knew each other, and children spent hours playing until dark, where every tree, bench and old wicket had its own story. In their place there are skyscrapers, parking lots, new facades and roads, rapidly changing the familiar urban landscape.

And it is not only that Almaty becomes different - along with the changes, the details that made up its unique face disappear: the green shadow above the street, the murmur of the aryk, the spaciousness of the yard, the old tree near the house, the familiar prospect of the street, which could not be confused with any other.

Therefore, paintings are perceived as evidence of vanishing time. In them, the artist preserves not only the architecture and landscapes, but also the very atmosphere of the city - its rhythm, light, breath, acoustics, soul. And looking at the landscapes, you suddenly realize that the disappearance of the city is not happening at once. It consists of many small losses: one tree, one aryk, one courtyard, one old house – until one day we find that the familiar city remains only in our memory. In this regard, it is especially sad to look at the building of the old airport, which no longer exists, at the usual panorama of Medeo, which today is changing. Nostalgic and such a beautiful exhibition of a wonderful artist whose works of art penetrate deeply into the soul.

Rashid Kulbatyrov formed a recognizable author's handwriting in the genre of modern urban landscape. At the heart of his artistic method is a careful, almost intimate observation of the surrounding reality, its subtle changes, rhythms and states. The artist not only captures the urban appearance, but passes it through his own emotional and plastic perception, turning familiar spaces into a special artistic reality.

Almaty in the works of Rashid Kulbatyrov is not so much an architectural object as a living organism - changing, breathing, filled with movement, light and memory. I would like to note another feature of Kulbatyrov’s work – in his works, light becomes not just a means of modeling form, but an important expressive element that can transform the familiar urban landscape. Morning and evening lighting, a clear day and dusk, the glow of the windows and soft shadows on the facades reveal the character of the same place in different ways, as if allowing you to see it again.

The change of the time of day and seasons gives the presented works a sense of inner movement. Winter, spring, summer and autumn become not only natural, but also different emotional states of the city itself. The color, light, density of space, character of streets change, and with them our perception of Almaty changes.

This is the special value of the urban landscape of Rashid Kulbatyrov: turning to familiar places, the artist suggests to look at them more closely and feel what often escapes in everyday haste. Almaty is a city of memory and the present moment, architecture and human presence, permanence and change. A city that is impossible to see once and for all, because it continues to change every minute, while retaining its unique breath.