Arthouse cinema kinoxona has moved to the center of Tashkent and opened the Chiroyli vanitas exhibition

Moving to the city center

The independent arthouse cinema kinoxona, which calls itself the only one of its kind in Uzbekistan, has moved to the center of Tashkent two years after opening in the Yakkasaray district. It has taken up a basement-level space in a three-story building at 17 Chimkent Street in the Mirabad district; nearby are the Blue Domes park and the Alisher Navoi Grand Academic Theater. Gazeta reports on the opening at the new location.

A smaller hall, the same format

Mikhail Borodin, co-founder of the cinema and of Tashkent Film School and a director, explained the move by the desire to make kinoxona part of the city's everyday life — a place one can drop into after work or classes, watch a film and stay for the discussion, while preserving its role as 'a space where people, ideas and different views of the world meet.' Practically the main change for audiences is the size of the hall: at the new location it is almost half the size of the previous one, 21 seats instead of 50. According to the publication, the large screen, quality sound and intimate atmosphere have remained the same. Since October 25 the cinema has been showing films almost every day — classics of world cinema, hits of international festivals and the year's arthouse premieres in the original language; the repertoire is licensed, and the team principledly refuses to work with pirated content. The opening program featured three films: Momo Seto's 'Dandelion Odyssey' from the Directors' Fortnight of the 78th Cannes Film Festival, Andrei Tarkovsky's 'The Sacrifice' and Takashi Miike's 'Audition.'

The Chiroyli vanitas exhibition

To mark the housewarming, the space has opened the Chiroyli vanitas exhibition by photo artist Elena Martinova, assembled by curator Svetlana Chistyakova: 14 photographic still lifes created over the past three years. The title refers to the allegorical still lifes of the Baroque era and the 17th-century Dutch vanitas tradition, which reminded viewers of the transience of life and the impermanence of earthly pleasures. According to the curator, in Martinova's work dying 'is neither condemned nor mourned — it is examined with the same attention as blooming': by photographing an object at the moment of its fading, the artist 'stops the disappearance and makes it visible for a long time.' The exhibition includes motifs typical of her work: withering flowers, fossils, corals and shells; she adds to her glass collection at the Yangiabad flea market. Visitors to the screenings can watch fresh flowers wither right in the hall — there is a vase with red carnations and dahlias standing there. The exhibition runs until November 30, admission is free. The cinema is open Tuesday through Sunday from 5:00 pm to 11:00 pm.