Thematic Painting
Aman Asrankulov works in the field of portrait and thematic composition. In such paintings as "Mulberry Cutting" (1974), "Tobacco Pressers" (1974), "Mowers" (1974), the process of labor is depicted directly, allowing the artist to convey the character of the natural environment and the uniqueness of labor rhythms. It should be noted that he is primarily attracted to manual labor, where mechanization has not yet replaced humans and where a person can demonstrate physical skill and agility, experiencing pleasure and joy.
Perhaps only "Mowers" depicts people during moments of rest, but even here the artist managed to convey a state of uplift and vigor, rather than serene relaxation. Asrankulov effectively conveys movement, which is palpable in even the most statuary depicted figures.
The leading theme in Asrankulov's work is the image of a person. He is interested in people of different ages and life experiences, where psychological depth is combined with poetic generalization in their portrayal.
A number of the artist's works are dedicated to childhood ("First Poems," 1969; "Boy with a Dog," 1971; "Portrait of a Daughter," 1974; "Boy by the Yurt," 1980).
These works are resolved in a romantically elevated manner, the images of children are transparent and pure, and the painterly language is bright and clear.
The small tempera "Boy with a Dog" is painted lightly, with bright colors that reproduce the state of a summer afternoon and a contemplative, thoughtless mood.
The romantic vein in Asrankulov's work is vividly expressed in the painting "Morning" (1984), which depicts a young girl at a window opened to the blue expanse. In her slender figure, there is a joy of life. A colorful rooster adds a major note to the painting, serving as a herald of dawn and happiness.
An important line in Asrankulov's work is related to portraiture. Here, there are both intimate depictions of close people and monumentally elevated representations of significant social figures.
Among his best works are "Portrait of Senior Sergeant of Militia K. Myrzaev" (1975), "Portrait of the Hero of Socialist Labor Metallurgist S. Teshayev" (1977), "Spinner" (1979), and others. The figurative content of this gallery embodies humanity and the accuracy of social-psychological characterization. The portraits are characterized by compositional variety and a strict color solution.
The work of A. Beishenov develops naturally and cohesively.
He primarily works in the genre of thematic painting, paying homage to the primitivism that was fashionable in the late 60s and early 70s ("Meeting," 1971; "Under the Apple Tree," 1974) with its narrative simplicity, decorativeness, deliberately amateurish drawing, and local coloring.
However, at the same time, he created works of high professionalism both in terms of figurative depth and formal characteristics.
In these works, the task of formal constructions is always subordinated to the revelation of the artistic image. For example, in his painting "Goats in the Thicket" (1971), despite the overt decorativeness of the painted surface, which almost relief-like depicts thickets of thistles and goats pushing through them, the substantive core is not the decorativeness itself, but the living state of the depicted objects and their sensitive perception by a person. The artist skillfully uses the conditionality of the painterly language to convey real images and real sensations.
A remarkable achievement of Beishenov's is the paintings "Years of War. Gathering Ears" (1973) and "Death of a Proletarian" (1982). Both paintings are painted with exceptional emotional uplift and drama. The first painting depicts a family, adults and children, gathering ears of grain into a bag after the harvest has already been collected — every ear of bread grown was so precious during the war years. The landscape is executed in a generalized manner, with large painterly masses.
The close outline of the edge of the harvest field slightly rounds, as if the entire earth has turned into a bread field. Behind the field, there is a complex dense blueness with barely outlined plasticity of the mountains. The human group is composed tightly, and in scale to the landscape, it seems somewhat exaggerated, which gives it a monumental-sculptural character.
The social theme is uniquely resolved in the painting "Death of a Proletarian." Here, Beishenov departed from the usual canons in embodying the revolutionary theme, using details of everyday life characteristic of Southern Kyrgyzstan of those years, such as a cart, home-woven striped bags, and the national clothing of the slain poor young man, which allowed the artist to create a sharply characteristic composition, where the harsh, almost graphic, decorativeness only emphasizes the tragedy of the situation.
The compressed space, the restless rhythm of lines and color relationships create a special atmosphere of ominous silence in the painting, still carrying echoes of a bandit raid.
In the portrait "Mother of a Soldier" (1985), Beishenov creates the image of a woman from the period of the Great Patriotic War.
The artist carefully, with great love, conveys the lovely features of a beautiful gray-haired woman, sadly sitting at a table. On the wall is a faded photograph of her son in a pilotka.
With a strict composition and restrained color palette, painted with subtle artistic taste, a moral assessment of great maternal patience and courage is given, and the spiritual atmosphere of the time is recreated.
Most of Beishenov's thematic compositions have an unfinished character ("Proletarian," 1978; "Boy with Birds," 1979; "Butcher's Shop," 1980; "From the Bazaar," 1980; "Osh Street," 1981). Despite the sketchiness of the painting, the figurative-substantive core is clearly traceable, reflecting the artist's reflections on life, the scope of his interests, and the direction of his search for means of artistic expressiveness.
Painting