Who Makes Contemporary Uyghur Art in Kazakhstan?

In Kazakhstan, political or artistic projects dedicated to the repression of Uyghurs in China by the Kazakhstani Uyghurs are rare, except for a few cases. One such exception was the exhibition of the anonymous collective of young Uyghur women artists from Kazakhstan, Sultan Kizlar, called “Behind the Curtain,” curated by Intizor Otaniyozova, Bernara Khasanova, and Ramil Niyazov-Adyljan.

According to the artists, for publicly undisclosed reasons, the exhibition never officially opened in January 2025 in Almaty. It may have been due to their public pro-Uyghur stance. As the artists write in their manifesto:

“We are a community of Uyghur artists, ‘Sultan Kizlar,’ named after the song of the dutar padishah Abdurreikhim Heyit with lyrics by Mahmut Zait. Our name is a tribute to the memory of a world-class musician who disappeared several years ago in China. For ideological, practical, and aesthetic reasons, each of us took a pseudonym [Yuldus Sadik, Nazugum Bakhtiyarova, Rashida Dilshad, Rukiya Farkhadova].”

Most Uyghurs outside of China live in neighboring Central Asia. Unlike Uyghurs and other Turkic and Muslim minorities in China, who have had to endure the horrors of the Chinese authorities’ policy of forced assimilation and mass political persecution for the past few years, the Uyghurs of Central Asia live a relatively peaceful and calm life.

Many Uyghurs in Kazakhstan don't discuss the plight of the Uyghur people in China. This is largely because most countries in the region are undemocratic, and it can be quite risky to raise such discussions. For example, when Kazakhstan's President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev met with the governor of Xinjiang in western China in 2023, he didn't discuss the rights of Kazakhs in China or the Uyghurs.

In the history of the Uyghurs in Kazakhstan, of whom there are about 270,000 people in the country, there is a misconception that they are all migrants and refugees from China. As researchers point out, a small part of Kazakhstan (a territory the size of Slovenia) did not belong to the Kazakh Khanate when the state was captured by the Russian Empire. It was annexed by Russia after the suppression of the Uyghur-Islamic uprising in the 19th century in what is now northern Xinjiang.

Global Voices spoke to Sultan Kizlar about what scared the relevant authorities about their exhibition, what makes their art contemporary and Uyghur, and what it means to be Kazakh Uyghur. The conversation was conducted in writing, with each artist answering one question. The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Global Voices (GV): Your first solo exhibition never officially opened with a vernissage, but it was on display for only a week and a half, and you could only invite people to it in person. Why did this happen?

Nazugum: This was the order given to people who were not interested in disseminating our art. To those who think it is strange when women make art in which they directly comprehend their religious experience while being anonymous and located outside of our beloved and dear Kazakhstan. Sometimes they say that ‘black PR’ is better than nothing, but as a result of these misfortunes, we did not receive the desired intellectual response beyond ‘conversations in the kitchens’ and one mention in the media.

GV: So it wasn't about the position on the “Uyghur issue,” but about the fear of any non-traditional religiosity for a post-Soviet, that is, post-atheistic, state?

Rukiya: Our beloved country has many sore spots, but one of the most painful is politically active Muslims and Uyghurs, so we are suspicious on two counts at once. You see, being a Uyghur, especially a religious one, means being a bargaining chip in the war game of empires, that is, in the new cold war between the US and China.

Outside of moral principles, Kazakhstan may be acting to its advantage when it maintains ‘neutrality,’ realizing its weakness in front of two fascist empires (Russia and China). But this means that for the sake of ‘peace’ and ‘independence,’ someone must be sacrificed. That's why we took pseudonyms, even though we are not in Kazakhstan, to protect our relatives and colleagues from possible attention from dangerous people. However, here in the West, many are also silent about the massacre in Gaza, so where in the world can we look for freedom now?

GV: You call yourselves a collective of Uyghur contemporary artists — what is “Uyghur” and “contemporary” in your art?

Rashida: ‘We are Uyghurs, and this drives us crazy,’ I wrote in our manifesto two years ago. ‘Uyghurness’ for us now is not about language, ethnicity, or nation. Just as you don’t have to be a Muslim to see hell on earth in the genocide in Gaza. You don’t have to speak Uyghur to imagine at least one of the hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs sitting in prison for years for no reason. And go crazy trying to imagine the hundreds of thousands [currently imprisoned in China]. That’s what is ‘Uyghur’ about us. We are not Uyghur artists. We are ‘Uyghur’ artists.

In Central Asia, people now like to celebrate their identity, mainly ethnic-national, but for us, this is another reason not to be proud of the greatness of our ancestors, not to exalt ourselves above others, but to see the death inside us. What we wear as creations of Allah. At the same time, we are wandering lost fugitives, looking with fury into the dim mirror of modernity.

We escaped from the vulgar native land, full — for us — of satisfying nonsense, not to sell ourselves (that is why we are anonymous). Our art is modern because we cannot talk about modern genocide with non-modern means.

GV: What are your plans for the future as a collective, and what are your hopes for the future of the Uyghur people?

Yuldus: We would like to continue making art in Kazakhstan or wherever life takes us. We dreamed about it and still dream about it! But now, perhaps, the curators will be afraid of us like lepers. But the will to create is inexhaustible — so we will come up with something else daring! And very tender. The girls, my colleagues, are often angry and take a position (I understand them!) as irreconcilable warriors, but in our works, there is a lot of sadness, love, and tenderness.