Moments of fleeting beauty. The photo exhibition Chiroyli vanitas has opened at the kinoxona cinema
The independent arthouse cinema kinoxona has moved to the city center. It is now located in the Mirabad district, near the Blue Domes Park and the Navoi Theater. The housewarming was celebrated with screenings of Tarkovsky, Miike, and Seto, as well as the opening of the Chiroyli vanitas photo exhibition. Read Gazeta's article to find out what makes it interesting.
Moments of Fleeting Beauty. The Chiroyli Vanitas Photography Exhibition Opens at kinoxona Cinema
Two years after launching in the Yakkasaray district, the independent arthouse cinema kinoxona—the only one of its kind in Uzbekistan—has moved to the city center. It is now located on the basement floor of a three-story building in the Mirabad district at 17 Chimkent Street. Nearby are the Blue Domes Park and the Alisher Navoi Opera and Ballet Theater.
"We have long wanted kinoxona to become part of Tashkent's daily life—a place where you could easily drop by after work or study, watch a movie, stay for a discussion, and accidentally discover something new. Moving to the center is our step toward the audience, an opportunity to make the cinema more accessible without changing the reason for its existence: to be a meeting space for people, ideas, and different views of the world," said Mikhail Borodin, director and co-founder of the Tashkent Film School and kinoxona.
Starting October 25, the cinema plans to screen classics of world cinema, hits from international festivals, and arthouse premieres of the year in their original languages almost every day.
The repertoire features licensed films: the team makes it a point not to work with pirated content.
The new hall is almost half the size of the previous one—21 seats instead of 50. At the same time, the large screen, high-quality sound, and intimate atmosphere conducive to discussion remain unchanged. The first viewers were able to see this for themselves during the opening program, which featured three films: Momoko Seto's *Dandelion Odyssey*—an animated film from the Directors' Fortnight program of the 78th Cannes Film Festival, Andrei Tarkovsky's final work *The Sacrifice*, and Takashi Miike's cult film *Audition*.
To mark the housewarming, an exhibition titled Chiroyli Vanitas by photo artist Elena Martynova opened in the space.
The title refers to the allegorical still-life paintings of the Baroque era, which served as reminders of the transience of life, the futility of earthly pleasures, and the inevitability of death. Such works most often centered around skulls, rotting fruit, candle stubs, and other objects symbolizing decay and mortality.
In her work, Elena Martynova follows the traditions of the Dutch *vanitas* rather than working in the classic still-life genre. The photo artist is drawn to wilting flowers, which remind her of masterpieces by master glassblowers, as well as fossils, corals, and empty shells—Martynova has an entire collection of them. Another of her passions is glassware, which she periodically replenishes at the capital's Yangiabad flea market.
The exhibition, curated by Svetlana Chistyakova, features 14 photo still lifes created by Elena Martynova over the past three years.
"17th-century Dutch masters worked with the symbolism of the still life. Extinguished candles, cracked goblets, and wilted flowers reminded the viewer of the transience of earthly things and served as a moral warning that all is vanity of vanities. In Martynova's work, decay is neither condemned nor mourned—it is observed with the same attention as blooming. By photographing an object at the moment of fading, the photo artist halts its disappearance and makes it visible long after the thing itself has vanished," the curator explains.
Martynova's photo still lifes are an ode to beauty as a state that inevitably changes, and to a moment that will never be repeated—whether it is the last dance of tulips wilting in a vase or the play of glints in the sharp facets of glass goblets.
Cinema visitors will be able to observe different stages of live flowers wilting inside the kinoxona space, much like the photo artist does in her home studio. To facilitate this, a vase with crimson carnations and dahlias has been placed in the room.
The Chiroyli Vanitas exhibition will be open until November 30.
Admission is free.
The kinoxona cinema is open Tuesday through Sunday from 5:00 PM to 11:00 PM.