Yerbolat Tolepbay is one of the most prominent contemporary artists in Kazakhstan. He was no less influential in his young years when, in late 1970s, he appeared on the arena of Kazakh art with his extraordinary paintings that solved conceptual and formal tasks so different from those worked on by the preceding generation.

Tolepbay’s artistic path began with showing respect for reality and natural forms. They had, however, very distinct and sharp expression.

The artist created large-scale paintings reflecting the spirit of time. The images he produced were the result of his deep reflections about a human being, the country and the world. Each detail in the compositions had special meaning. The objects of art and past events shown in his works helped to feel deeper the sense of the present.

Tolepbay felt he was an heir to the global culture. He had courage to enter into a dialogue with the great Rembrandt in Artist’s Youth (1980), where he juxtaposed, in the form of a diptych, his portrait with a girl on his lap and a bold replica of Rembrandt with Saskia.

Before the break-up of the Soviet Union, Tolepbay created many big paintings rich in symbolic and social motives. These included The Running Youth (1976-1977), In an Aul (1977), The Everyday Life of Mangyshlak (1978), A Farewell to Turksib Builders (1982), Guests of an Artist (1984), Kokpar (1985), and The Voice of Sounds (1987), among others.

When the autumn of 1991 came as a shock to many, he needed some anchorage to live through the confusion in his soul. So, there is no surprise that he painted Mother in 1992. His manner changed totally. The figure of woman with a sewing machine appears in the dark space as a beautiful phantom. The contours of her figure are painted in flamboyant colours as if she’s emitting endless warmth of her soul. Her kerchief is not just white – it is shining, evoking an association with the pureness of thoughts and hearty wisdom. The painter will return to this image and create several astonishing variations of it.

The compositions show yurt interiors with subtle hints to objects because the main thing they enclose are the feelings linked to childhood, expressed in either a cheerful, or elegiac melody of colours. The doorway open to the endless step and bottomless skies is a splendid metaphor of a nomad’s connection with the nature and the universe.

The time of complicated compositions ended, giving place to the understanding of the stunning individuality of simple things. Time came for the poetry of painting and colourful metaphors. Fragile and tender, almost ethereal creatures, full of mystery and nobility, appeared in the artist’s works. They are like precious pieces made of unknown material from the cosmic space. The palette became complicated and shimmering – people’s figures reminiscent of candle fires. It was for a reason that Carlos Castaneda said that, “We are luminous beings.” To see a human being like this, one needs to make a huge effort, a giant work inside themselves, or penetrate the secrets of being. To do so, an artist needs to have the talent to feel the world, life and the meaning of things.

The characters of Tolepbay’s new paintings were a mother and a child, friends, neighbours, sisters, and lovers. The connections between the figures are so accurate that one can see souls communicating. In 1991, Tolepbay painted Two in the Steppe – the bottomless blue sky and the lively shining energy emitted by the moon or a star towards fragile figures as if in an attempt to make contact with them. In 2003, he made A Woman in the Steppe – a delicate dream in a tender blue vastness. In 2004, he painted Kyz Zhibek – astonishing “sky” camels bringing precious goods. The artist has many other paintings, no less delightful.

All of them are filled with incredible lightness and transparency. This is a painted tale about something unsaid, indescribable or inexpressible in common language, which can only be transmitted by a poetic word, rich in metaphors. This is the state of poetry filling the world, a note of beauty that sounds
quietly and tenderly. Mysteries are always near – one only needs to reach out their hand to touch them.

Valentina BUCHINSKAYA