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ALMATY, Kazakhstan — A towering consultant of the police state, faceless, however empowered by epaulets as he wields the scales of justice, looms over a diminutive man standing in a pocket of sunshine.
On the edges of the grim image, different figures identifiable solely by their navy and police apparel creep by means of a thick fog. Streaks of crimson trace at an ever-present hazard.
The inspiration for this graphic illustrated by Bishkek artist Tatiana Zelenskaya isn’t troublesome to guess.
On November 23, a Bishkek courtroom stripped Kyrgyzstan-born investigative journalist Bolot Temirov of his citizenship after discovering him responsible of illegally acquiring a passport and ordered his deportation to Russia, the place he spent his childhood.
Temirov’s supporters have argued that the case towards him was concocted as punishment for his workforce’s investigation focusing on the enterprise actions of highly effective nationwide safety chief Kamchibek Tashiev’s household.
The decision has been condemned by rights activists in Kyrgyzstan and overseas, a UN rights envoy, and Western governments amid a widening crackdown in Central Asia’s most democratic nation.
However for illustrator Zelenskaya, Temirov’s battle with authority is the most recent topic for her distinctive model of digital artwork that has captured imaginations throughout a turbulent few years in Kyrgyzstan.
Amid the gloom, Temirov “seems to be forward with out concern, the one particular person within the image who has a face, a imaginative and prescient,” Zelenskaya instructed RFE/RL in an interview about her paintings.
“The opposite figures have solely types and postures, representing their roles and positions within the police-gangster hierarchy,” the illustrator mentioned.
Ache And Loss On The Border
One in all Zelenskaya’s most well-known photos so far is amongst her most tragic.
When in April 2021 border violence on an unprecedented scale broke out between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, 12-year-old Madina Rakhmatzhanova’s dying amid shelling provoked an outpouring of anger and grief on Kyrgyz social media.
Zelenskaya’s tribute to the younger lady (beneath) personified Rakhmatzhanova because the uncommon aigul flower that’s indigenous to Batken, the Kyrgyz area devastated by the clashes that left scores of lifeless in each nations.
The transferring picture of the crying youngster rooted to a land below projectile fireplace was nonetheless being utilized in social media avatars when a second main battle on the border started in September, resulting in much more casualties than final yr’s preventing.
“I consciously tried to keep away from depicting some form of enemy. I wished as an alternative to emphasise how fragile our world is and name for a direct finish to the violence,” Zelenskaya mentioned.
Within the wake of the preventing in September, Zelenskaya selected to focus on solidarity as an alternative of grief, paying tribute to a gaggle of Batken schoolchildren who mobilized to supply shelter to folks fleeing the battle zone.
Demonic Corruption
Zelenskaya prefers to painting by inference, however there have been few doubts in regards to the identification of the demonic villain that she set towards a backdrop of belching smokestacks — a nod to the filthy air that settles in Bishkek each winter when the heating season begins — in 2019.
A media investigation by RFE/RL, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Mission, and Kyrgyz media outlet Kloop had implicated former customs official Raimbek Matraimov in schemes that despatched a whole bunch of tens of millions of {dollars} out of Kyrgyzstan — findings that introduced protesters onto the streets to demand the powerbroker’s arrest.
Then-President Sooronbai Jeenbekov responded to the uproar by demanding “details” to justify motion towards a person extensively considered as his ally.
Zelenskaya mentioned she was shocked by how deeply what she referred to as her “emotional response” to occasions within the nation resonated on-line.
Months after Jeenbekov was overthrown in 2020, Matraimov was positioned below investigation and convicted on embezzlement expenses.
However his punishment was settled with a advantageous and repayments to the state somewhat than jail time, including to the sense that the U.S.-sanctioned businessman enjoys impunity in his homeland.
Gender-Primarily based Violence
In 2017, Zelenskaya and her animator husband Egor Tankov revealed a collection of animations on “ala-kachuu” — the crime of bride-kidnapping that’s deeply ingrained in lots of components of Kyrgyzstan.
The animations — One Day They Stole Me — mirrored the real-life tales of victims and have been lined by native and worldwide media.
Gender-based violence stays a scientific downside throughout the nation, with rights campaigners usually portraying the state as disinterested in prosecuting abusers.
This view was encapsulated in a 2021 Zelenskaya illustration used to publicize a protest after one younger girl, Aizada Kanatbekova, was brutally murdered by her bride-kidnapper.
The illustration as soon as extra reveals legislation enforcement as a shadowy presence, watching impassively as a younger girl is pushed away by her abductors in a automotive forged within the crimson and gold colours of Kyrgyzstan’s flag.
Yet one more haunting Zelenskaya picture from 2020 featured a girl standing bowed on a mountain with two automotive tires suspended from a rope tied round her neck.
On this event, the illustration was no metaphor — a video had simply gone viral exhibiting a girl struggling precisely the identical torture by the hands of her abusing husband — who additionally beat her and doused her with chilly water.
Zelenskaya supposed her surrealist tackle the harrowing footage to be “a monument to all girls in Kyrgyzstan who’re subjected to violence.”
Amid broad condemnation of the abuse, the lady’s husband was arrested earlier than being let off with a two-year probationary sentence by a neighborhood courtroom.
One thing To Rejoice
Zelenskaya is commonly reprimanded for focusing her work on the darker aspect of public life in Kyrgyzstan.
Exhibit A within the artist’s protection is her impression of three feminine athletes who helped Kyrgyzstan to its most successful-ever Olympics by scooping a silver and two bronze medals on the video games in Tokyo.
Zelenskaya’s graphic exhibiting wrestlers Aisuluu Tynybekova, Meerim Zhumanazarova, and Aiperi Medet-kyzy basking within the vibrant glow of their achievements proved to be successful on social media.
So, too, did her portrayal of Begimai Turusbekova, a housewife who turned an in a single day star this summer season after movies emerged of her performing karaoke one night in a Bishkek park.
Zelenskaya’s paintings recalled Turusbekova throughout one of many nights that adopted, performing in the identical park, however now in entrance of a whole bunch of latest smartphone-wielding followers.
The village-born vocalist despatched the gang into raptures as she belted out numbers akin to Celine Dion’s My Coronary heart Will Go On, higher often known as the theme from the worldwide blockbuster movie Titanic.
Since then, Turusbekova has showcased her vary at Kyrgyz authorities occasions and on Russian tv for presenter Andrey Malakhov’s present Hi there, Andrey.
“I used to be touched by her simplicity — her pink costume and her head scarf,” Zelenskaya instructed RFE/RL of the footage from the park that helped catapult Turusbekova to fame. “The entire scene had a poster-like high quality to it that made it inconceivable to disregard.”
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