° 1965

Born in Bes Terek (UZ), lives in Shymkent (KZ).

Said Atabekov is an artist from Shymkent in the south of Kazakhstan, a region that has preserved its Asian heritage to a greater extent than the country’s northern regions have. After his studies, Atabekov became a member of the Red Tractor group, the first artists’ collective set up in the area after the Perestroika. Through performances, videos and installations, the group questions the archetypes of Central Asian culture: myth, religion, pantheist rites, nature and shamanism. Atabekov alternately employs video and photography to communicate the post-modern paradox, where the symbols of globalization insert themselves into locations that are extremely isolated and still firmly anchored in local tradition. Key elements of the artist’s work include national identity and character, the conflict between man and nature, and the conflict between tradition and innovation.