Video, collage, animation, 2025
Adel Ismailkhanova
My collage animation is dedicated to the museum staff, past and present. These are people whose work, while perhaps not always visible, is incredibly important and rewarding. At one time, I was surprised to learn that the museum employs over 100 people. While creating the animation from archival photographs, it was fascinating to see the staff in their everyday lives, but it was also a joy to see how they find time for group outings and get-togethers, celebrate holidays, and even weddings. In the animation itself, I wanted to show the core of the museum—the people, their emotions, their work, and the shared encounters inside and outside the museum. The starry sky, the daytime sky depicted in the paintings, and the rising sun serve as a metaphor for the museum’s life and continuity. It’s a reminder that the museum has been living and breathing for 90 years thanks to its people.
“Adel Ismailkhanova wanted to personify the everyday life of the museum—a cycle that begins anew each day and ends, like the stars here, continuing and passing from one generation to the next. All these traditions, perhaps, and the way people communicate and interact, as well as the significant moments of the museum itself.”
“When this work was featured in the previous exhibition, the security guards’ favorite piece was this one. Every day, all the guards would come in a line, sit together on the bench, and watch—because they saw themselves in this collage. They were so happy to be noticed, to be part of an artistic sequence, to be included in this process. Every day, they would come, look, take photos of themselves, and send them to their families.”
🎧 Alima Tokmergenova about Adel Ismailkhanova’s work [in Russian]:
MAJIC 