Biography
Äsel Kadyrkhanova is a visual artist and researcher with a PhD from the University of Leeds. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis, University of Amsterdam. Her research looks at art as a medium of memory, with a focus on post-Soviet postcolonial Central Asia. She explores transgenerational memory and trauma, addressing the burden of silenced pasts and unmourned personal losses.
Kadyrkhanova works across drawing, textile, installation art and moving image. Her research interests include haptic visuality, embodiment, affect and trauma. Her works have been shown in QAGOMA (Brisbane), Centre for Contemporary Art (Glasgow), Centre for Heritage, Art and Textile (Hong Kong), documenta 15 (Kassel), Calvert Foundation (London), Hackelbury Fine Art (London), Tselinny Centre for Contemporary Culture (Almaty), Kazakh National Museum of Arts (Almaty), YARAT (Baku), Garage Museum of Contemporary Art (Moscow) among others. Publications include chapters in edited volumes, Stalinism in Kazakhstan: History, Memory, Representation (Lexington Books, 2021) and Suture: Reimagining Ornament (Hong Kong: MillCHAT, 2023), and other.
Before her current postdoctoral position, she worked as an Assistant Professor of Fine Art at KIMEP University, Kazakhstan.
Contact
Social media
Education
2016 – 2021
2009 – 2011
2005 – 2007
2001 – 2005
PhD (Practice-led) School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies (FAHACS), University of Leeds
MFA Fine Art, Newcastle University
MA Painting, Kazakh National Academy of Arts
BA Painting, Kazakh National Academy of Arts
Fellowships & Scholarships
2023
2018
2016
2009
Postdoctoral Research Fellowship. Project title: Artistic Research and Contested Heritage, Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis (ASCA), University of Amsterdam
CEC Artslink Fellowship, USA
Leeds Anniversary Research Scholarship, University of Leeds
Bolashak International Scholarship of the President of Kazakhstan
Current events and collaborations
Co-organiser of Postcolonial Hauntologies: Art in the Presence - Absence of the Past, international symposium held jointly at the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands) and Concordia University (Canada).
Co-founding member of Suture: Central Asian Artistic Research Group
2025
2022 - ongoing
Publications
Dreamscapes, Traumascapes, in Your Own Spaces: Multiperspectivity and Spatial Practices in Audiovisual Forms of Knowledge Production, edited volume (HSLU and Diaphanes Press, 2025)
Stitch, Unstitch, in Suture: Reimagining Ornament, collective volume (Almaty | Hong Kong: MillCHAT, 2023)
Becoming a Secondary Witness: Art, Trauma and the (Non-) Memory of the Kazakh Famine, 1930 - 1933, in Witnessing, Memory and Crisis, conference proceedings (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022)
The Endless Time After: Art as a Medium of Memory in Post-Stalinist Kazakhstan, in Stalinism in Kazakhstan: History, Memory, Representation, ed. Zh. Abylkhozhin, M. Akulov, A.Tsay (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2021)
Selected exhibitions and screenings
2025
2023
2023
Asia Pacific Triennial Cinema. All the Dreams We Dream. Central Asian Short films, QAGOMA, Brisbane
Medium and Memory, Hackelbury Fine Art, London
Samizdat Eastern European Film Festival, Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow
2023
2023
2022
2021
2019
2018
2018
2018
2017
2017
2017
2017
2016
2013
goEast Film Festival, Weisbaden
Clouds, Power and Ornament: Roving Central Asia, Centre for Heritage, Art, and Textile (MillC.H.A.T.), Hong Kong
documenta 15 - Davra Collective's public programme, Kassel
Calvert Journal Film Festival, London
Living Memory, Almaty City Museum, Almaty
CITATION, within the European Artistic Research Network (EARN) conference, Leeds
Focus Kazakhstan: Post-Nomadic Mind, Wapping Project, London
At the Corner: City, People, Places, Tselinny Centre for Contemporary Art, Almaty
Mixer Sessions III, Mixer Gallery, Istanbul
Windows of Tolerance (solo show), Project Space, University of Leeds
Suns and Neons above Kazakhstan, Yarat Contemporary Museum of Art, Baku
Internal Memory: Not Enough Space? Video screening programme by Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow
Cartography of the Real, Central Exhibition Hall, Almaty
1938: Territory of Memory, State Museum of Fine Arts named after Kasteev, Almaty
Selected artist Residencies
2023
2018
2015
2015
UNIDEE Residency: Neither at Land nor at Sea, Module V, Cittadellarte Fondazione Pistoletto, Italy
Artist in Residence, California College of the Arts, USA
Protagonists: The Invisible Pavillion of Kazakhstan, group residency by IADA during 56th Venice Biennale. St Erasmo, Italy
The Eighth River, group residency and land art exhibition, Ile Alatau National Park, Kazakhstan
Artist Talks
2024
2023
2018
2018
2018
2018
On Artmaking, Dreams and Legacies of Violence, Limestone Books, Maastricht
Paired session with Lia Dostlieva, ARRG (Artistic Research Research Group), University Theater, Amsterdam
Artist Lecture, California College of the Arts, San Francisco, USA
Artist talk, Silk Road House, Berkeley, CA, USA
Paired dialogue with Inga Lace at Artists and Global Citizenship: CEC Artslink Assembly, Lenfest Center for the Arts, Columbia University, USA
In conversation with Dr Katy Deepwell, Almagul Menlibayeva, within Focus Kazakhstan project, Wapping Project, London, UK
Teaching
Spring 2024
2021 – 2023
2019 – 2021
Guest Tutor: MA Artistic Research, University of Amsterdam
Assistant Professor of Fine Art, College of Humanities and Education, Kimep University
Teaching Assistant, School of Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies (FAHACS) University of Leeds