Dilyara Kaipova (Uzbekistan) was shortlisted for her work Yellow Steppe Danger Signs, evoking a conversation between ancient heritage and recent history. Locating the intersection between folk artisan traditions and contemporaneity, the artist designs original patterns and produces her ‘Ikat’ fabrics in collaboration with traditional masters.
How did you initially start creating art using Ikat fabrics?
Patterns are just everywhere in our country — on clothes, some furniture, carpets, they’re put on buildings out and inside, they’re being used everywhere and there is a lot of them and they’re very diverse. I’ve always wanted to understand the underlying meaning of them — you cannot always see it at first glance, and I also wanted to try to change the structure of the pattern. I got an opportunity to do so and chose clothes patterns exactly. It was in 2015 and I was sure that I would do this experiment just once.
What was the inspiration behind this particular work, and the rendering of nuclear signage?
I was born in the USSR and we used to be told a lot about the threat of nuclear war, we had special classes at school where they explained the basics of the military to us and how to save ourselves when under a chemical or a nuclear threat like explosions, bombs etc. Later Chernobyl happened and a nuclear attack threat from North Korea not too long since, plans on building atomic electrical stations in our region appeared. I think that this danger always follows humans, and in 2022 it got more real than ever before.