From March 19 to June 1, 2025, the National Museum of Arts of the Republic of Kazakhstan named after Abilkhan Kasteyev in Almaty presented a unique retrospective exhibition of the outstanding artist Ural Tansykbaev.
“This exhibition has become another step towards strengthening cultural cooperation between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan – countries that Ural Tansykbaev connected in his work. The exhibition opened in a jubilee year for the museum, marking its 90th anniversary and the year it was granted National status, which became a special event in the cultural life of the country,” emphasized the director of the National Museum of Arts named after Abilkhan Kasteyev, Zhumabekova Gulaim Musagulovna.
This exhibition was the first in the last 40 years to cover all the main stages of the master’s creativity – from early works of the late 1920s to early 1930s to mature large-scale canvases of the “thaw” era.
Exhibition guests saw about 78 works of painting and graphics, brought from the State Museum of Arts in Tashkent, the Tashkent House-Museum of Ural Tansykbaev, the State Museum of Arts of the Republic of Karakalpakstan in Nukus, as well as from the collection of the State Museum of Arts of the Republic of Kazakhstan named after Abilkhan Kasteyev.
The exhibition provided a detailed account of the artist’s life, his dramatic creative fate, and the complex evolution of his style – from the modernist experiments of his early years to monumental landscapes filled with deep symbolism and philosophical resonance.
Particular attention at the exhibition was given to Tansykbaev’s early works, which reflected the influence of Russian avant-garde and French modernists. Among the exhibits were famous canvases such as “Crimson Autumn” (1931), “Self-Portrait” (1935), as well as works from the period of the Great Patriotic War and iconic landscapes of the “thaw” era.