In our second episode, we’re joined by Berlin-based, Almaty-born multidisciplinary artist Almagul Menlibayeva in a conversation on art and freedom, from the legacies of Kazakh craft to a nuanced perspective on the region.

Our starting point is Menlibayeva’s comprehensive retrospective 'I Understand Everything' at Almaty Museum of Arts, an inaugural exhibition for the museum, widely marked as Central Asia’s first private institution dedicated to modern and contemporary art on this scale. The artist reflects on what it means for a new institution to grow “from within”: through long-term relationships between a collector, local business, and the cultural field, and how this pinpoints the visibility of contemporary Kazakh art. 

Menlibayeva revisits her late-Soviet underground experience with the 'Green Triangle', developing a central idea: if the past is constructed by others, society loses the power to shape its future. The episode traces how this awareness informs her practice as a method of re-seeing. 

The artist highlights textile as a cultural code. Felt, ornament, and embroidery as material languages have long existed outside market and institutional frameworks, often carried through women’s knowledge. This traces into the artist's 'Cyber Textile' series and the questions of authorship raised from her work with AI.

Further discussed is the women’s images across 'My Silk Road to You', and 'Red Butterfly' in relation to the “people’s” narratives that survive beyond official storylines. For the artist, the concept of Silk Road emerges not as a single route but as a multiplicity of trajectories, expanding into the twentieth century through industrialization, forced displacement, and the Soviet regime's Gulag systems. 

Her retrospective lens brings us to the region’s traumatic sites of memory, and the history of Asharshylyk, addressed through Menlibayeva’s academic researches and personal narratives. 

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.
Read more on this conversation at fora-gallery.com
Check available works by the artist on artsy.net