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Portraiture and Proximity: ‘Official’ Artists and the State-ization of the Market in Post-Soviet Kazakhstan

This article traces the production and circulation of state officials' portraits in post-Soviet Kazakhstan, as visual artists engaged in the cultivation of an art market after the dismantling of socialist-era state sponsorship. I argue that these portraits of the president and other high-ranking officials should be considered as an instance of commercialisation of art. Portraiture invoked proximity of artists to their powerful sitters, government officials, and consequently made artists' work more attractive to a particular kind of domestic buyer. Furthermore, I argue that these practices of commodification enable an understanding of how socialist-era legacies of state sponsorship have converted into the logics of proximity to power. The Soviet-era personalistic connections to bureaucrats have transformed into the means for representation of artwork's market value in contemporary Kazakhstan. As such, Soviet legacies of clientelism have rendered state icons as significant authenticators of commercial value and therefore central to the emerging market.