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Euronews
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Euronews
Bukhara Biennial: A ten-week exploration of food, art, craft and music
From 5 September to 20 November 2025, this UNESCO Creative City will host the inaugural Bukhara Biennial, a ten-week journey of contemporary art, communal rituals, and culinary storytelling. Titled 'Recipes for Broken Hearts', the Biennial transforms a city of legends into a living stage where grief, memory and joy are reimagined through food, music, poetry and craft. Curated by international art figure Diana Campbell and commissioned by Gayane Umerova, Chairperson of the Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation (ACDF), the Biennial features over 70 commissions created in Uzbekistan, activating centuries-old madrasas and caravanserais in ways Bukhara has never seen. 'Bukhara has shaped the world before: through knowledge, craft, and exchange,' says Umerova. 'This Biennial is a way of giving it the tools to do so again, through creativity and dialogue'. Not just an exhibition. A sensory ritual. Rather than opening with a red carpet or gallery wall, the Biennial begins with the aroma of fermentation. At Cafe Oshqozon, Buddhist monk and chef Jeong Kwan will prepare kimchi on the first day — only to unearth it again ten weeks later for a final meal, ripened by time and silence. It is a metaphor for the event itself. 'Recipes for Broken Hearts' explores how time, tradition, and care can heal. Every element – from food to sculpture, textiles to sound is part of a broader experiment in emotional repair. Diana Campbell, known for her work at the Dhaka Art Summit, calls it a 'multi-sensory feast rooted in Bukhara's spirit of hospitality and intellectual depth'. She adds, 'You don't just look at the art. You smell it, taste it, feel it in your hands and bones'. From salt and sugar to clay and code The artworks span disciplines and geographies. Egyptian-born food artist Laila Gohar conjures memories through Navat, a traditional sugar crystal made from saffron and grape juice. Colombian artist Delcy Morelos constructs a dome from earth, sand, and spices. Uzbek artist Oyjon Khayrullaeva, working with ceramicist Abdurauf Taxirov, builds mosaic organs - a stomach over the cafe entrance, lungs and hearts tucked across the city connecting venues as parts of one collective body. And then there's Subodh Gupta, who repurposes enamel dishes from traditional kitchens into a towering dome, inside which guests dine on dishes connecting India and Uzbekistan. 'It's about collapsing distance — between countries, between disciplines, between people,' he says. All works are made in Uzbekistan, many in collaboration with local artisans. 'This was non-negotiable,' says Umerova. 'We didn't want an art fair. We wanted something that speaks from here, even when it reaches the world'. At the centre of the Biennial is the House of Softness, a transformation of the 16th century Gavkushon Madrasa into a space for public programmes, children's workshops, and storytelling. Artist and architect Suchi Reddy has designed a protective canopy inspired by Uzbek ikat casting patterns of healing across the courtyard. Here, a three-day symposium titled 'The Craft of Mending' will bring together thinkers, historians and artists to explore repair as both a physical and political act. 'Erasure is a form of heartbreak,' says Aziza Izamova, an Uzbek scholar at Harvard leading the event. 'And so, to repair to remember - is an act of resistance'. Young curators from across Asia will also gather in Bukhara for a workshop on how to commission work that does not yet exist. It is a fitting lesson for a city reshaping its own future. Music, too, flows through the Biennial's veins. Each full moon will be marked by a ceremonial karnay ritual – the long Uzbek horn used in weddings to symbolically summon water to the desert. These performances, led by Himali Singh Soin and David Soin Tappeser, fuse local tradition with global environmental consciousness. Elsewhere, the Bukhara Philharmonic will collaborate with artists like Tarek Atoui, bringing together Arab and Central Asian musical traditions. Weekly street processions and spontaneous performances will animate the city with rhythm and memory. Food is not a side programme, it is the soul of the Biennial. From fermented rituals to nomadic grains, the meals are designed to explore loss, resilience and belonging. Uzbek chefs like Bahriddin Chustiy and Pavel Georganov will share dishes infused with memory, while guest chefs like Fatmata Binta from Sierra Leone and Zuri Camille de Souza from India will link Uzbek traditions to West African and Goan culinary heritage. The final week hosts the Rice Cultures Festival, featuring plov, paella, pulao and jollof rice cooked in the open air, surrounded by stories and songs. 'It's not about haute cuisine,' says Umerova. 'It's about how we gather, how we heal, how we remember - through food'. Why Bukhara? 'Bukhara is not a backdrop,' says Umerova. 'It is the protagonist'. For over two millennia, the city has been a center of spiritual, scientific and artistic exchange. Yet in the modern art world, it has remained peripheral, until now. The Biennial is part of a broader national strategy to reintegrate Uzbekistan into global cultural networks. With support from President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, the ACDF has launched restoration projects, museums, and creative platforms across the country and internationally including the Venice Biennale pavilion and the Expo 2025 in Osaka. 'This is not soft power,' Umerova insists. 'It's structural power. Culture creates jobs. It shapes futures. It builds identity that isn't reactive or nostalgic — but alive, generous, and forward-looking'. Bukhara is accessible by high-speed rail from Tashkent and Samarkand, with boutique hotels and guesthouses nestled among its UNESCO-listed architecture. The Biennial is entirely free and open to the public. Foreign visitors can expect immersive programming in Uzbek, Russian, and English, and a culinary scene where history is served with every dish. More information is available at and on Instagram at @
Straits Times
03-07-2025
- Politics
- Straits Times
Crimea's Tatars, scarred by past, fear their homeland will be ceded to Russia in peace deal
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox Ethnic Crimean Tatar Leniie Umerova, 27, posing for a picture during an interview with Reuters, in Kyiv, Ukraine, on June 10. KYIV - When Ukrainian Leniie Umerova crossed into Russia on her way to see her ailing father in their native Crimea in late 2022, she was detained and forced to endure what she calls a 'carousel' of charges and prison transfers that lasted nearly two years. The ordeal, which included stints in solitary confinement, crystallised a sense of generational trauma for Ms Umerova, 27, a member of the Crimean Tatar community indigenous to the Black Sea peninsula that Russia invaded in 2014 and illegally annexed from Ukraine. 'It was very difficult because I was constantly alone in my cell and they (the Russians) periodically tried to feed me their propaganda,' said Ms Umerova, who initially faced administrative charges and later accusations of espionage, which she denied. Ms Umerova had grown up listening to her grandmother's stories of how in 1944 the family, along with hundreds of thousands of other Crimean Tatars, were deported to distant Central Asia on Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin's orders for alleged collaboration with the Nazis, even though many Tatars including her great-grandfather were fighting for the Red Army. Thousands died from disease or starvation, and the Tatars were only allowed back to Crimea in the 1980s. Now, Ms Umerova fears that Crimea, as part of a final Ukraine peace deal, could be recognised as part of Russia - a scenario that the Trump administration in the United States has signalled is possible. 'For so many years now, the same enemy has been doing evil to our family,' Ms Umerova said. 'If we don't fight now and overcome this, where are the guarantees that my children or my grandchildren won't get the same (treatment)?' Always before her is the example of her grandmother, who refused to speak Russian when Ms Umerova was young and immersed the family in Tatar culture and language. 'Whatever happens, we must return to Crimea,' was the message. Ms Umerova returned to Kyiv after being released by Russia in a prisoner swop in September 2024, and despite her suffering, she remains hopeful that the Tatars, a Sunni Muslim, Turkic people, will one day be able to live freely again in a Ukrainian Crimea. 'Every day, every year... you live with the dream that now, now, now they will deal with this one thing and return Crimea... And so it will be, I am 100 per cent sure of this,' she added. Russia won't budge But Russian President Vladimir Putin has insisted that any peace settlement for Ukraine must include recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea and four other Ukrainian regions. Moscow denies Kyiv's assertions that it is violating the rights of Tatars and other people in Crimea, which it says is historically Russian. A woman looking from a balcony decorated with Russian flags and a portrait of Russian President Vladimir Putin, in Sevastopol, on the Russian-occupied peninsula of Crimea, on June 5. PHOTO: REUTERS According to the Ukrainian President's Mission in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, some 133 Crimean Tatars are currently illegally imprisoned by Russia. Russia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. 'To give (Crimea to Russia) is to simply spit in their faces,' Ms Umerova said of those detained Tatars and of the tens of thousands who continue to live in occupied Crimea. Russia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment on this article. At the time of Russia's annexation, Crimean Tatars accounted for around 12 per cent of the peninsula's population of some two million. They rejected Russia's occupation and boycotted a referendum at the time, and community leaders estimate that some 50,000 have left since 2014, though most have remained there. A 2014 photo shows Crimean Tatars holding a sign reading 'referendum boycott' in the Crimean village of Eskisaray, outside Simferopol, Crimea. PHOTO: REUTERS Crimean Tatar rights activist and journalist Lutfiye Zudiyeva, who lives there, said Russia had subjected her community to what she called 'active assimilation'. 'Of course, today in Crimea you can sing in Crimean Tatar and dance national dances, but the people have no political agency,' she said. Crimea is internationally recognised as part of Ukraine by most countries but US President Donald Trump told Time magazine in April that 'Crimea will stay with Russia'. Under peace proposals prepared by Mr Trump's envoy, Mr Steve Witkoff, the United States would extend de jure recognition of Moscow's control of the peninsula. However, the two sides have made little progress in peace talks since April. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is trying to resist Mr Trump's pressure to cede territory to Russia as part of any peace settlement, and he has cited Ms Umerova's case as an example of what he says is Moscow's repression of the Crimean Tatars. For Ukrainian singer Jamala, who won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2016 with her song '1944', about Stalin's deportations, any talk of legally recognising Crimea as Russian is 'insane'. 'If a country like America says 'it's no big deal, let's just forget about it and move on', then there are no guarantees in the world,' Jamala told Reuters. REUTERS
The Star
03-07-2025
- Politics
- The Star
Crimean Tatars, scarred by past, fear homeland will be ceded to Russia in peace deal
KYIV (Reuters) -When Ukrainian Leniie Umerova crossed into Russia on her way to see her ailing father in their native Crimea in late 2022, she was detained and forced to endure what she calls a "carousel" of charges and prison transfers that lasted nearly two years. The ordeal, which included stints in solitary confinement, crystallised a sense of generational trauma for Umerova, 27, a member of the Crimean Tatar community indigenous to the Black Sea peninsula that was annexed from Ukraine by Russia in 2014. "It was very difficult because I was constantly alone in my cell and they (the Russians) periodically tried to feed me their propaganda," said Umerova, who initially faced administrative charges and later accusations of espionage, which she denied. Umerova had grown up listening to her grandmother's stories of how in 1944 the family, along with hundreds of thousands of other Crimean Tatars, were deported to distant Central Asia on Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin's orders for alleged collaboration with the Nazis, even though many Tatars including her great-grandfather were fighting for the Red Army. Thousands died from disease or starvation, and the Tatars were only allowed back to Crimea in the 1980s. Now Umerova fears that Crimea, as part of a final Ukraine peace deal, could be recognised as part of Russia - a scenario that the Trump administration in the United States has signalled is possible. "For so many years now, the same enemy has been doing evil to our family," Umerova said. "If we don't fight now and overcome this, where are the guarantees that my children or my grandchildren won't get the same (treatment)?" Always before her is the example of her grandmother, who refused to speak Russian when Umerova was young and immersed the family in Tatar culture and language. "Whatever happens, we must return to Crimea," was the message. Umerova returned to Kyiv after being released by Russia in a prisoner swap last September, and despite her suffering, she remains hopeful that the Tatars, a Sunni Muslim, Turkic people, will one day be able to live freely again in a Ukrainian Crimea. "Every day, every year... you live with the dream that now, now, now they will deal with this one thing and return Crimea... And so it will be, I am 100% sure of this," she added. RUSSIA WON'T BUDGE But Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that any peace settlement for Ukraine must include recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea and four other Ukrainian regions. Moscow denies Kyiv's assertions that it is violating the rights of Tatars and other people in Crimea, which it says is historically Russian. According to the Ukrainian President's Mission in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, some 133 Crimean Tatars are currently illegally imprisoned by Russia. Russia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. "To give (Crimea to Russia) is to simply spit in their faces," Umerova said of those detained Tatars and of the tens of thousands who continue to live in occupied Crimea. Russia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment on this article. At the time of Russia's annexation, Crimean Tatars accounted for around 12 percent of the peninsula's population of some two million. They rejected Russia's occupation and boycotted a referendum at the time, and community leaders estimate that some 50,000 have left since 2014, though most have remained there. Crimean Tatar rights activist and journalist Lutfiye Zudiyeva, who lives there, said Russia had subjected her community to what she called "active assimilation". "Of course, today in Crimea you can sing in Crimean Tatar and dance national dances, but the people have no political agency," she said. Crimea is internationally recognised as part of Ukraine by most countries but U.S. President Donald Trump told Time magazine in April that "Crimea will stay with Russia". Under peace proposals prepared by Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, the United States would extend de jure recognition of Moscow's control of the peninsula. However, the two sides have made little progress in peace talks since April. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is trying to resist Trump's pressure to cede territory to Russia as part of any peace settlement, and he has cited Umerova's case as an example of what he says is Moscow's repression of the Crimean Tatars. For Ukrainian singer Jamala, who won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2016 with her song "1944" about Stalin's deportations, any talk of legally recognising Crimea as Russian is "insane". "If a country like America says 'it's no big deal, let's just forget about it and move on', then there are no guarantees in the world," Jamala told Reuters. (Additional reporting by Elizabeth PiperEditing by Gareth Jones)
Straits Times
03-07-2025
- Politics
- Straits Times
Crimean Tatars, scarred by past, fear homeland will be ceded to Russia in peace deal
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox FILE PHOTO: Crimean Tatars take part in a pro-Ukranian meeting in the Crimean village of Eskisaray, outside Simferopol, March 14, 2014. The sign reads \"Referendum boycott\". REUTERS/Vasily Fedosenko/File Photo KYIV - When Ukrainian Leniie Umerova crossed into Russia on her way to see her ailing father in their native Crimea in late 2022, she was detained and forced to endure what she calls a "carousel" of charges and prison transfers that lasted nearly two years. The ordeal, which included stints in solitary confinement, crystallised a sense of generational trauma for Umerova, 27, a member of the Crimean Tatar community indigenous to the Black Sea peninsula that was annexed from Ukraine by Russia in 2014. "It was very difficult because I was constantly alone in my cell and they (the Russians) periodically tried to feed me their propaganda," said Umerova, who initially faced administrative charges and later accusations of espionage, which she denied. Umerova had grown up listening to her grandmother's stories of how in 1944 the family, along with hundreds of thousands of other Crimean Tatars, were deported to distant Central Asia on Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin's orders for alleged collaboration with the Nazis, even though many Tatars including her great-grandfather were fighting for the Red Army. Thousands died from disease or starvation, and the Tatars were only allowed back to Crimea in the 1980s. Now Umerova fears that Crimea, as part of a final Ukraine peace deal, could be recognised as part of Russia - a scenario that the Trump administration in the United States has signalled is possible. "For so many years now, the same enemy has been doing evil to our family," Umerova said. "If we don't fight now and overcome this, where are the guarantees that my children or my grandchildren won't get the same (treatment)?" Always before her is the example of her grandmother, who refused to speak Russian when Umerova was young and immersed the family in Tatar culture and language. Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. 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Umerova returned to Kyiv after being released by Russia in a prisoner swap last September, and despite her suffering, she remains hopeful that the Tatars, a Sunni Muslim, Turkic people, will one day be able to live freely again in a Ukrainian Crimea. "Every day, every year... you live with the dream that now, now, now they will deal with this one thing and return Crimea... And so it will be, I am 100% sure of this," she added. RUSSIA WON'T BUDGE But Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that any peace settlement for Ukraine must include recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea and four other Ukrainian regions. Moscow denies Kyiv's assertions that it is violating the rights of Tatars and other people in Crimea, which it says is historically Russian. According to the Ukrainian President's Mission in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, some 133 Crimean Tatars are currently illegally imprisoned by Russia. Russia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. "To give (Crimea to Russia) is to simply spit in their faces," Umerova said of those detained Tatars and of the tens of thousands who continue to live in occupied Crimea. Russia's Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment on this article. At the time of Russia's annexation, Crimean Tatars accounted for around 12 percent of the peninsula's population of some two million. They rejected Russia's occupation and boycotted a referendum at the time, and community leaders estimate that some 50,000 have left since 2014, though most have remained there. Crimean Tatar rights activist and journalist Lutfiye Zudiyeva, who lives there, said Russia had subjected her community to what she called "active assimilation". "Of course, today in Crimea you can sing in Crimean Tatar and dance national dances, but the people have no political agency," she said. Crimea is internationally recognised as part of Ukraine by most countries but U.S. President Donald Trump told Time magazine in April that "Crimea will stay with Russia". Under peace proposals prepared by Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, the United States would extend de jure recognition of Moscow's control of the peninsula. However, the two sides have made little progress in peace talks since April. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is trying to resist Trump's pressure to cede territory to Russia as part of any peace settlement, and he has cited Umerova's case as an example of what he says is Moscow's repression of the Crimean Tatars. For Ukrainian singer Jamala, who won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2016 with her song "1944" about Stalin's deportations, any talk of legally recognising Crimea as Russian is "insane". "If a country like America says 'it's no big deal, let's just forget about it and move on', then there are no guarantees in the world," Jamala told Reuters. REUTERS
The Guardian
28-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Cosmic metros, UFO circus tops and a 3,000C sun gun: the mesmerising architecture of Tashkent
A pair of huge turquoise domes swell up on the skyline of Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, perching on the jumbled horizon like two upturned bowls. One gleams with ceramic tiles, glazed in traditional Uzbek patterns. The other catches the light with a pleated canopy of azure metal ribs. Both recall the majestic cupolas that crown the mosques of the country's ancient Silk Road cities of Samarkand, Khiva and Bukhara. But here, they cover structures of a very different kind. The ribbed metal dome crowns the home of the state circus, its futuristic-looking big top seeming to have been crossed with a UFO. Built in 1976, it's big enough to hold an audience of 3,000. The ceramic dome, meanwhile, looms over the bustling chaos of the city's main market, Chorsu Bazaar, built in 1980 as a wonderworld of fruit, meat and fish, sprawling across an area the size of two football pitches. Both are dazzling works of Soviet modernism, and part of a remarkable group of buildings that the country has just submitted to Unesco, in the hope of having them granted world heritage status. 'People tend to think of Uzbek heritage as our ancient Islamic monuments,' says Gayane Umerova, chair of the country's Art and Culture Development Foundation (ACDF). 'But we need to realise that we are in danger of losing the more recent layers of history, due to urban development. We have to act now.' Over the last few years, the ACDF has been highlighting Tashkent's unique postwar heritage, hosting conferences, commissioning expert research, and now publishing two hefty books about the period, as well as putting the topic in the global spotlight with an exhibition at the Venice architecture biennale, opening shortly. This push was triggered in 2018, following a public outcry over the demolition of a beloved cylindrical concrete movie theatre, the House of Cinema, built in 1982. It was hastily bulldozed to make way for a $1.3bn commercial development, a bloated cluster of generic glass towers known as Tashkent City. 'It was a big loss for our society,' says Umerova. 'It wasn't just about the building –people had grown up with the cinema as a place to go on dates, see friends, hang out. Its sudden loss made us look at what else might be in danger.' In the line of fire, potentially, is one of the most unusual collections of modernist buildings anywhere in the world. About 2,000 miles from Moscow, Tashkent occupies a fascinating position in the history of the Soviet Union as a showcase city, bridging east and west. It was designated a 'beacon of socialism in the east', conceived as a vast vitrine to display the successful socialist transformation of a non-Russian city. Its image of prosperity, abundance, leisure and progress would show how communism could be adapted to the diverse, far-flung populations of Central Asia – and therefore to the rest of the world. An earthquake in 1966 provided a convenient excuse to raze much of the historic city and impose a masterplan of wide avenues dotted with grand, orientalist structures that would speak of Tashkent's new role as the modern gateway to Asia. The buildings are a fascinating mix, combining the latest technologies and construction techniques of international modernism with ornamental details that hark back to the 15th-century architecture of the Timurid dynasty. That became adopted as the official national style, and remains so to this day, despite it being of little historic relevance to Tashkent. 'Interestingly, the buildings designed for Tashkent in Moscow were much more decorative and 'orientalist' than those designed locally,' says Ekaterina Golovatyuk, a Russian architect whose Milan-based practice Grace has been leading the preservation strategy. 'It was like they were trying to present an imaginary, exoticised image of Tashkent back to local people.' She is standing outside the former Lenin Museum, now the state history museum, a gleaming white marble jewellery box. Wrapped with supersized latticework screens, it appears to float above a recessed glass lobby on a hidden steel frame. The building was created in 1970 by the snappily titled Central Scientific Research and Experimental Project Institute for Entertainment and Sport, an elite Moscow bureau that delivered prestige projects across the USSR. Despite the bold modernist form, its design consciously draws on tradition, with the geometric screens referencing vernacular Uzbek panjara, or latticework grilles that provide shading and ventilation, as well as Islamic patterns (a fact not mentioned at the time). 'The design was criticised locally for being superficial,' says Golovatyuk. 'But it launched a new direction. Gradually, this would become the language of modernist Tashkent.' The domed circus is a striking example of how these aesthetic attitudes evolved. It was first drawn up in the early 1960s, by architects Genrikh Aleksandrovich and Gennady Masyagin, as a brutalist flying saucer, studded with porthole windows. Construction began in 1965, but was halted by the earthquake. As time went on, the space-age design became historicised, clothed in traditional fancy dress. The inspiration was no longer a UFO, but an Uzbek piala, or teacup. Decorative concrete sunshades were added, in a form that echoed ancient Kufic script. The interior is a surreal mashup, where concentric cosmic rays radiating from the doorways became encrusted with traditional ornamentation, like a spaceship decked out in chintzy wallpaper. Other experiments to celebrate the regional context focused less on decoration than on local typologies. One of the most radical projects of the era is the Zhemchug (or Pearl) housing block, designed as a vertical expression of the traditional mahalla courtyard homes. Built in 1985, the 16-storey tower features a pair of communal courtyards every three storeys, providing space for children to play, while elderly residents sit out playing chess and drinking tea. Front doors are reached via outdoor galleries that look down into these back yards in the sky. 'I love its uniqueness,' says Dilara, who has lived here for decades. 'We've used the courtyards for weddings, barbecues and drinking beer together. There is a strong sense of community.' A rooftop swimming pool, now a pond, was added to increase stability in the event of an earthquake. It is surrounded by mushroom-shaped sunshades that double as ventilation for all the kitchens down below. Sadly, this inventive design didn't take off. 'It was the first building in Uzbekistan to use sliding concrete formwork,' says Golovatyuk, referring to a system where the moulds are moved up while concrete is poured continuously. 'It was supposed to be cheaper and faster, but it turned out to be slower and much more expensive.' Still, its occupants seem to love it. They've even curated a little exhibition about its female architect, Ophelia Aydinova, in the lobby. Cost may have deterred any repeat, but money was no object when it came to symbols of national pride. As the planned economy began to falter in the 1980s, the baubles of Soviet pomp became ever grander. As Golovatyuk puts it: 'When a regime isn't doing so well, the need for representation gets even bigger.' She is standing outside a prime example, the gargantuan Palace of People's Friendship. Unveiled in 1981, its ornate hall seats over 4,000 in a pharaonic temple of culture, dripping with gilded ceramics and crystal chandeliers. Designed by the team behind the Lenin Museum, led by Yevgeny Rozanov and Elena Sukhanova, it is a tour de force of Uzbek modernism. Raised on a plinth, the museum is wrapped in a muscular facade of panjara-inspired grille-work, crowned with a colossal frieze of abstract muqarnas, the sculptural stalactite motifs found inside the domes and niches of Islamic architecture. Inside, the ceiling of its triple-height atrium groans with pearly chandeliers, evoking dangling branches of cotton bolls, while the walls are lined with fluted blue tiles and expressionistic ceramic sculptures by Alexander Kedrin. The floors, meanwhile, writhe with geometric marquetry. It has the look of an immense marble Transformer, seemingly about to unfold into a great robotic creature and march towards the circus. There are more wonders dotted throughout the city, beautifully photographed by Karel Balas for a Rizzoli coffee-table book, and meticulously examined in a 900-page tome for Lars Müller, with pictures by Armin Linke. The metro system is a particular treat, especially Kosmonavtlar (or Cosmonauts) station, built in 1984 as a cosmic fantasy of blue tiled walls, green glass columns and celestial light fittings, evoking the wonders of space exploration. Perhaps the most spectacular of all lies an hour outside the city, perched on a hillside in Parkent. Looking like something dreamed up by a Bond villain, the Sun Heliocomplex is an astonishing sight, a 20-storey convex cliff of mirrors, able to channel the sun's energy to a temperature of 3,000C. Completed in 1987, it was designed to test the resistance of materials to nuclear explosion and develop heatproof ceramics for the Soviet military. Since the collapse of the USSR, it has hobbled along, working with agriculture, textile and mining industries. Although it was a classified project, off-limits to most, it was intended as a showcase of applied arts, featuring sculptural ceramic screens and dazzling planetary chandeliers by artist Irena Lipene. A seven-tonne example will be shown in Venice, capturing in crystal the end-of-the-world glamour of the nuclear age. Sergo Sutyagin, a leading Uzbek architect, hailed this 'cosmic architecture', praising how it 'poetically and fantastically emerges' from the hillside, 'prompting philosophical reflections on the reality of the unreal, on the possibility of the impossible'. The space race having moved elsewhere, you can now visit the complex and harness the immense power of the sun to boil a kettle or fry an egg. Tashkent: A Modernist Capital is out now
