{"id":275806,"date":"2026-05-01T16:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T21:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/compte-rendu\/bukhara-biennial-recipes-for-broken-hearts\/"},"modified":"2026-05-05T08:56:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T13:56:09","slug":"bukhara-biennial-recipes-for-broken-hearts","status":"publish","type":"compte-rendu","link":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/reviews\/bukhara-biennial-recipes-for-broken-hearts\/","title":{"rendered":"Bukhara Biennial<\/br>Recipes for Broken Hearts<\/em>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
In a region renowned for its exuberant arts-and-crafts tradition and yet home to few contemporary art scenes, the inaugural Bukhara Biennial in Uzbekistan aimed to bridge the gap between these two worlds. For the over seventy newly commissioned works in the exhibition, international and regional artists were tasked with collaborating with Uzbek artisans to realize their works; materials and techniques were also sourced in the region. In this way, the biennial skilfully grafted a globally sourced spectrum of concepts onto the local system of craft making, suggesting a new model for developing and commissioning art in the region.<\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Having long been an intellectual and economic nexus along the Silk Roads, Bukhara was once a point of confluence for myriad cultural and religious influences. The biennial was embedded within the rich architecture of Bukhara\u2019s historic centre, which was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1993. To the east of the Toqi Sarrofon trading dome, away from the touristy area of Lyabi Khauz Square, gradually unfolding along the canal are ancient mosques, traveller\u2019s lodges, madrasas, and markets, which now hosted contemporary art within their original domes, porches, courtyards, and niches. Although it offered complex and rich topics, the Bukhara Biennial, organized by Los Angeles and Dhaka-based curator Diana Campbell, lightheartedly drew on themes from everyday life: food, gatherings, and healing. Its title, Recipes for Broken Hearts, <\/em>comesfrom a local tale in which the polymath Ibn Sina cured a desperate lover\u2019s heartbreak by inventing plov<\/em>, now an Uzbek national dish. Made of rice, a blend of meat, root vegetables, animal fat, and spices, plov<\/em> is traditionally cooked in large quantities to serve hungry guests at community gatherings. It has become a symbol of the region\u2019s hospitality and abundant food resources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Abundance is precisely what the biennial tried to offer. The exhibition was like a meal full of flavours, aromas, and tastes, and the selection of artworks highlighted a variety of sensory experiences. At the entrance to Khoja Kalon Mosque stood Delcy Morelos\u2019s La Sombra Terrestre <\/em>(2024\u200a\u2013<\/em>25), made in collaboration with local artisan Baxtiyor Akhmedov. With cinnamon, clove, and turmeric powder incorporated into its construction, this golden pyramid pavilion diffused a warm and spicy aroma under the sun, further strengthening the ritual of entering the mosque. In the courtyard of Caravanserai, David Soin Tappeser\u2019s Mur-Mur <\/em>(2024\u200a\u2013<\/em>25) invited visitors to compose melodies from traditional clay whistles (khushtak<\/em>) that had been produced with clay-toy expert Kubaro Babaeva and her students. The tunes collected resembled chirping bird flocks; they swept through the ancient buildings and revived memories of the local practice of pigeon flying. In tandem with these olfactory and aural explorations was Laila Gohar\u2019s installation Navat Uy<\/em> (2024\u200a\u2013<\/em>\u200a25), focusing on gustatory art. This pavilion, a collaboration with the artisan Ilkhom Shoyimkulov, picked up the ancient technique of crystallizing rock sugar from grape syrup and adapted it into a building material. The sugar glimmered in the sun; every night, it attracted local kids to taste it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
\"Delcy
Delcy Morelos
<\/strong>La Sombra Terrestre<\/em>, 2024\u201325, installation view, Bukhara Biennial, Bukhara, 2025.
Photo: Adrien Dirand, courtesy of the Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n
\"David
David Soin Tappeser
<\/strong>Mur-Mur<\/em>, 2024\u201325, installation view, Bukhara Biennial, 
Bukhara, 2025.
Photo: Andrey Arekelyan, courtesy of the Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n
\"Laila
Laila Gohar
<\/strong>Navat Uy<\/em>, 2024\u201325, installation view, Bukhara Biennial, Bukhara, 2025.
Photo: Felix Odell, courtesy of the Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Throughout the biennial, art was thoughtfully integrated into the original architecture as part of the lived surroundings. Marina Perez Sim\u00e3o\u2019s painting Untitled <\/em>(2024\u200a\u2013<\/em>25) depicted an eye\u2019s mystical gaze into the sky, suggesting humans\u2019 connection with the celestial. At Caravanserai, it was fired into the tile flooring of the central courtyard by the tile artisan Bakhtiyar Babamuradov and was transformed into a dance floor at night. Oyjon Khayrullaeva\u2019s Eight Lives <\/em>(2024\u200a\u2013<\/em>25)presented a series of mosaic body organs exploring the connections between emotional and physical wellbeing. With artisanship by Raxmon Toirov and Rauf Taxirov, the work was camouflaged within the city\u2019s fabric as bench tops, door headers, and parts of interior and exterior walls across different historic structures. Kei Imazu\u2019s Arc of Arrival <\/em>(2024\u200a\u2013<\/em>25) functioned as gate fixtures guarding the side entrances to the Khoja Kalon mosque. Crafted with artisans Pavel Makarov and Rustam Muzaffarov, this two-part gate installation symbolized the threshold into birth and new life. Traditionally, crafts are utilitarian forms of art deeply integrated into everyday life, combining aesthetics and functionality. To the extent that they blended into the built environment, the artworks presented at the biennial blurred the boundary between crafts and Conceptual arts. Compared to other contemporary art exhibitions, at which the audience is usually forbidden from touching the artworks, here, haptic contact was encouraged. The biennial valued artisans\u2019 contributions on an equal footing with those of contemporary artists, and the names of both were listed together in the exhibition pamphlet. Could we imagine ourselves living, in the future, amid a palimpsest of contemporary art that directly shapes our built environments, with artworks serving as tablecloths, plates, desks, chairs, and toilets? The idea of intermingling conceptual art with everyday objects would be an intriguing path for the region\u2019s contemporary art to take.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\n
\n
\"Oyjon
Oyjon Khayrullaeva
<\/strong>Eight Lives<\/em>, 2024\u201325, installation view, Bukhara Biennial, Bukhara, 2025.
Photo: Adrien Dirand, courtesy of the Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Commissioned by the state-funded Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation, <\/em>the inaugural Bukhara Biennial took a successful first step toward establishing a path for regional artmaking. Differentiated from other large-scale events, in which resources and labour are typically shipped to the site from elsewhere, the biennial also evinced an ambition to foster a local economy and ecology for contemporary artmaking, building on the existing artisanal tradition. However, the biennial represented only the start of a long-term process. It will take years to develop an organic and sustainable creative network requiring the effort of multiple stakeholders. It remains to be seen how the biennial will continue to evolve and shape the regional art ecology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bukhara Biennial,<\/strong> Bukhara<\/br>September 5\u200a\u2013\u200aNovember 23, 2025<\/br>","protected":false},"author":6506,"featured_media":275799,"template":"","categories":[884],"numeros":[8014],"disciplines":[],"statuts":[],"checklist":[],"auteurs":[7561],"artistes":[7057,6857,8118,8088,8070],"thematiques":[],"type_compte-rendu":[],"class_list":["post-275806","compte-rendu","type-compte-rendu","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews","numeros-117-crip","auteurs-alice-xinyi-lin-en","artistes-david-soin-tappeser-en","artistes-delcy-morelos-en","artistes-kei-imazu","artistes-marina-perez-simao-en","artistes-oyjon-khayrullaeva-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/compte-rendu\/275806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/compte-rendu"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/compte-rendu"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6506"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/275799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"numeros","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/numeros?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"disciplines","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/disciplines?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"statuts","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/statuts?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"checklist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/checklist?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"auteurs","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/auteurs?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"artistes","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artistes?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"thematiques","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/thematiques?post=275806"},{"taxonomy":"type_compte-rendu","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esse.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/type_compte-rendu?post=275806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}