Temirtas Iskakov
Temirtas Iskakov is an independent researcher who finds inspiration in natural and cultural artifacts in urban/rural territories and their untold or forgotten visual history. He lives and works in Astana, Kazakhstan. His works explore the transformations that communities and spaces in Kazakhstan underwent during controversial and dramatic periods of Colonization, Sovietization, and Independent Kazakhstan times.
The word 'apa' means elder sister, grandmother, mother, female ancestor, or a female person who is older, wiser, and stronger. According to Kazakh belief, an apa cares for and protects her children and the land she resides on — even beyond her physical life. The realm in which an apa exists encompasses both material elements, such as the landscape and artifacts, and intangible aspects, including oral history, knowledge, and rituals of everyday life — such as recipes, stories, and songs passed down through generations. The descendants of an apa are considered her embodiment in the world of the living
APALAR MEKENİ / LAND OF MOTHERS
The installation consists of three elements:
- Altın Apa's kurak körpe / patchwork from the 1960s (velvet, corduroy).
- Fragments of an audio interview with Marua Apa, the last living relative of the author's grandmother's generation.
- The stories of three women whose lives and destinies fell in the 20th century - two grandmothers and a great-grandmother written by a grandson who acts as a researcher.
- Altın Apa's kurak körpe / patchwork from the 1960s (velvet, corduroy).
- Fragments of an audio interview with Marua Apa, the last living relative of the author's grandmother's generation.
- The stories of three women whose lives and destinies fell in the 20th century - two grandmothers and a great-grandmother written by a grandson who acts as a researcher.
Temirtas uses photography, audio-video, light, sound, and physical objects to unveil and explore the concepts of "the right to memory" and "the right to place." He aims to show the connection between architecture, history, and the identity of communities, spaces, and commemoration places, which is only sometimes obvious but is always surprising and fascinating. As a Kazakh repatriate from Siberia, through the study of family histories and documents, as well as interviews with Kazakhs in the Omsk region, he explores the theme of displacement/relocation, interstate and intergenerational boundaries, hereditary of traumas, and the relationship between mentality and landscape,
By documenting disappearing, ruined, or abandoned spaces in the rapidly changing modern cityscape and the atmosphere of bygone eras, which they translate every day, Temirtas celebrates people's lives and relationships with each other and the place they lived. The buildings are not just buildings; those four walls hold amazing, inspiring, and terrible stories that need to be known. He believes that storytelling creates a more holistic knowledge about us and the place where we live. Temirtas hopes that his work helps to intermediate and reconnect people with the past, the place they live, and each other as the fundamentals of resilient and sustainable social and ecological systems.
By documenting disappearing, ruined, or abandoned spaces in the rapidly changing modern cityscape and the atmosphere of bygone eras, which they translate every day, Temirtas celebrates people's lives and relationships with each other and the place they lived. The buildings are not just buildings; those four walls hold amazing, inspiring, and terrible stories that need to be known. He believes that storytelling creates a more holistic knowledge about us and the place where we live. Temirtas hopes that his work helps to intermediate and reconnect people with the past, the place they live, and each other as the fundamentals of resilient and sustainable social and ecological systems.
APALAR MEKENİ installation is dedicated to the women and the power of their will and love, passed down from generation to generation. The artwork explores the theme of family memory and the artifacts that transmit it, the relationship between tangible and intangible heritage, personal and national tragedies of the 20th century, natural landscape, and the 'sense of land'. Through research, the author seeks to answer the following questions: Does knowledge of family history and genealogy matter? What do we know about the lives of our immediate ancestors? How does this knowledge affect us?