Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- Today, an opening of the Florentine section of the exhibition “Uzbekistan: Vanguard in the Desert” took place at Palazzo Pitti, Uffizi Gallery, Florence.

On 16 April 2024, the exhibition “Uzbekistan: Vanguard in the Desert” opened for visitors.

The Florence section of the exhibition project “Uzbekistan: Avant-Garde in the Desert” is called “Light and Color” and focuses on the image of Central Asia in the art of the first half of the 20th century, starting with Russian Orientalists who worked in Turkestan before 1917, and ending with representatives of the national school of painting, which was formed in Uzbekistan as a result of intercultural dialogue and exchange.

During the dramatic historical processes of the first half of the 20th century, Uzbekistan became a place of life and work, as well as an inexhaustible source of inspiration for artists of different nationalities and creative views. The change in artistic paradigms in the region generally corresponded to the periodization of Soviet art. 

The so-called Turkestan avant-garde (instead of which the curators of the exhibition propose the broader and inclusive term Avanguardia Orientalis), which replaced Orientalism, gradually and forcedly gave way to painting that meets the ideological guidelines of socialist realism. However, the pictorial culture of “light and color”, necessary for the perception and communication of local nature, architecture and everyday life, was developed and enriched through various concepts in art.

The exhibition Light and Color features paintings that demonstrate different approaches to these themes. The main attention is paid to the generation of artists of Avanguardia Orientalis: Alexander Volkov, Nikolai Karakhan, Nadezhda Kashina, Elena Korovay, Mikhail Kurzin, Ural Tansykbaev, Oganes Tatevosyan, Usto Mumin (Alexander Nikolaev), Viktor Ufimtsev. In their works, the techniques of modernist painting enter into an interesting dialogue with the traditions of Central Asian folk art and the natural color of Uzbekistan.

Tomorrow, on 17 April, the Venetian part of the exhibition “Form and Symbol” will open in the exhibition space of the University of Ca Foscari, Venice.

The section of the exhibition “Uzbekistan: Avant-garde in the Desert” “Light and Color” will be open in Florence at Palazzo Pitti from 15 April to 29 July 2024. “Form and Symbol” will be open from 17 April to 29 September 2024 in the exhibition space of the University of Ka- Foscari in Venice.