CHILLTAN SUV
Performative video installation
Duration: all day
Realised in the framework of DAVRA collective's public programme at documenta fifteen in Kassel, Germany
2022


CHILLTAN SUV is a performative video installation on the “re-/birth”of women as a bearer of water and healer of all earthly beings.

Performers: Dana Iskakova, Nazira Karimi, Aïda Adilbek
Costume design: Assel Nussipkozhanova

Costume production: Saltanat Sherim

A TABLE II
Participatory peformative project
2019


A TABLE is a series of exploration into domectic notion of sharing and communicating around a table. Its a second installment and a continuation of A TABLE I video installation.

I invite the viewers to participate in the feast around the table and share a meal together. Gathered people are either groups of acquiantances or strangers that met for the first time. In the built-in slots of the table they can observe themselves from top view filmed on the webcam that directly transmits their actions to the screens. The food on the table is what I believe is my “home” food. It is a mix of Central Asian and Slavic cuisines.
A TABLE II
Curated by Oana Damir and shown at the Changing room.
VIOLATOR
Performance
Duration: 30 mins
2019


Performance VIOLATOR is my inevitable response to series of political injustice happening in my home country as well as in the world.
During the performance a wall was covered with pewter coins that were connected to my forehead on fishline and later on to my chest. As hard as I try to move forward while playing the drum set, tighter the lines pull me back to the wall.

The project found its continuation in 2020 in the form of a small object called “VIOLATOR II”.

VIOLATOR
JEZTYRNAQ
Performance
Duration: 30 mins
2018
In Kazakh folklore the most important and terrifying antagonist appears in the form of a tall, cold female figure named Jeztyrnaq. She comes at night at the hearth of travelers in the forest and waits until they fall asleep to kill them, cutting their throats with her long, copper nails. Killing Jeztyrnaq herself is possible only by cutting off her nails, which was usually done by the valiant heroes of fairy tales.
This nightmare has been haunting me since I was a child. My dad first told me about her and I could not fall asleep for a long time, catching the creak of her nails in the silence of the streets. Now grown up, I still haven't got rid of insomnia and fear of Jeztyrnaq. From now on I am scared that in one of those nights I will become one of them: tall and cold, standing over the dead man's body.
JEZTYRNAQ starts as I am sharpening my nails with an axe then moving the wooden block to the center using it as an altar and sacrificing my nails.

JEZTYRNAQ
Performed at "Red pill" group show in G.Aitiev Museum of fine arts in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan
UNTITLED A
Performance
Duration: 2 hours
2017



I started a series of unscripted performances that will be titled “UNTITLED A to Z”. The project is a continuous search of meanings in actions, surroundings and oneself.
In UNTITLED A I start to unwrap a silky purple textile covering the floor of the space inch by inch, repeating my motions in round trajectory. I sew the edges of the fabric by hand and try to navigate all of my movements only around the light. I don’t see further than a half a metre, ever guessing if I am any closer to the end.
When I don’t have any textile left I decide to suspend the lamp with a long piece of cloth to bring more light into the space, but it keeps slipping away. After several failed attempts I decide to cover the lamp, leaving myself and viewers in the darkness, therefore never seeing an end of my labour.

UNTITLED A
Performed at Performance Platform Lublin, 2017, Poland
THE HOAX
Performance
Duration: 3 hours
2017


THE HOAX is a humorous or malicious deception.
In the performance I am lying in the vitrine-type refrigirator, watching TV shows, posting selfies and reading art magazines.

HOAX

Performed at a Group show Act of Creation” in the basement of Arman Cinema Center, Almaty, Kazakhstan.