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Central Asian Project
Kathy Rae Huffan describes Central Asian Project, a programme of residencies and cultural exchange between artists from the UK and Kazakhstan that took place between 2006-08.
The Central Asian Project took place during 2006-08, and was a collaborative artistic exchange between England, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. It was an opportunity for artists and curators to experience cross-cultural working, sometimes in extreme situations. It was also an experiment in communication and trust. The model is not a new one, and has been successfully followed in many projects. The difference for the Central Asian Project was our desire for participants to try to work with their various and inevitable preconceptions and misinterpretations about their host culture, and use these innate prejudices to inform the work they would create. The lessons learned would be central to our personal growth and understanding of cross-cultural working. What were these initial impressions? British people know Central Asia to be a land of mystical shamanistic practice, located on the ancient Silk Route of Genghis Khan, which is a vast and harsh landscape, full of untapped natural resources. A Russian-speaking country, it has a politically nascent government, still recovering from the break-up of the USSR. Travel between cities remains difficult. To Central Asians, England is perceived as...
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