How did you come to work with felt, and what does it symbolize for you?

Felt is not just a material. In Kazakh culture, it has always been a living matter of everyday life and spirit: it warmed, protected, created a home, and accompanied a person through the most important moments of life. A child took their first steps on felt. Khans were raised to power on white felt.
It lived in every yurt, every ritual, every movement of the hands that transformed wool into warmth and meaning.
My connection with felt began in childhood, with my grandmother.
She not only taught me how felt is born - she revealed its inner secret. Her hands moved calmly and confidently, and I watched soft wool turn dense, warm, alive. She spoke not with words, but with gestures, silence, and attention to the material.
Through her, I understood: felt is the language of memory.
It preserves the warmth of hands, the breath of the earth, the strength of women’s tradition. It contains the silence of the steppe and the energy of infinite space - a place where a person has always felt part of nature.
Today, when I create my works, I continue tradition while seeking my own voice.
For me, felt is neither a technique nor a craft. It is heritage - something I develop in a contemporary context as a medium of memory, tactility, and inner light. In every layer, there is a generation, a respect for one’s roots; in every work, there is an attempt to materialize a spiritual state.
I give voice back to a material that for centuries has spoken of home, freedom, and the quiet strength of the steppe people - allowing it to speak in the present.

Is there a connection between the nature of Kazakhstan and the structure of your works?

My works are landscapes of memory.
The steppe is a space of silence, light, and infinity, where the wind carries history and the horizon opens the feeling of freedom. Its rhythm is slow and steady, like breathing, like a heartbeat.
I do not depict the steppe literally - I aim to capture its state. Soft lines of the horizon, transparent light, a sense of openness and inner quietness - these become the foundation of my works. For me, the steppe is endless inspiration and a way of sensing the world.
I’m drawn to the philosophy of the steppe - its calm confidence, respect for space, and the ability to exist and breathe in full presence. It’s a source of strength, energy, and contemplation.
The structure of my works is layered: time, memory, wind, grass, human stories. These layers may dissolve into space like sounds across the steppe, but they do not disappear - they return to the silence from which everything begins.

Can your practice be seen as a form of visual meditation?

Absolutely. Felt is not born instantly - it requires time, repeated gestures, concentration, and trust in the process. For me, it’s a form of meditation through material.
I’m not interested in creating an image; I cultivate the surface as soil for inner sensation. It’s work with deep memory — personal, cultural, maternal. Felt absorbs not only water and pigment, but also silence and breath.

How do you find balance between tradition and modernity?

My grandmother taught me attention, simplicity, respect for the material and for time. Felt is the ancient language my ancestors spoke.
I preserve this way of working and gradually expand it through color, composition, and contact with the material.
I work with what comes from the earth: wool, plants, natural pigments.
These materials have existed in the steppe for centuries and carry its breath. Their simplicity does not limit - it opens depth, silence, and inner harmony of form. It remains relevant today.
I use ancient wool-working techniques and find new possibilities within them.
Each layer is both a movement of memory and a gentle opening toward the future.
When I create my paintings, I sometimes play the shankobyz (jaw harp).
The vibration of its sound passes through the body, the material, and the space - the process becomes one breathing.
It’s not a ritual but a natural part of my method: sound, silence, and wool enter into dialogue.
Everything that came before me, and everything being born now, meets in one place.

What are you exploring now, and where do you see your work going next?

I am now focused on the theme of inner silence. I study silence as power - as a space of healing.
I am interested in the boundary between the material and the immaterial - the place where wool becomes light.
My next step will be a series of large-scale felt canvases and a spatial installation that will allow the viewer to quite literally enter the steppe through their own sensations.

The exhibition “Aruhan: Felt, Memory and Silence” will run until February 1, 2026. We invite you to visit the exhibition in Kazakhstan and explore Gauhar’s art more closely.