Questions of memory and identity are central to the Tselinny project. Though a product of Soviet imperialism, the movie theater was etched into the minds of many Almatyites, since it was the kind of place one went on a first date—and, indeed, recounts Khan, Boranbayev took his wife there when they were first courting. Preserving the building and keeping its name are a way, he says, for citizens to take possession of their colonial past, although the exercise proved more difficult than anticipated. On the one hand, the cinema had been insensitively converted into a multiplex in the early 2000s, leaving it in a mutilated state; on the other, engineers were skeptical that any of the original fabric could be adapted to today’s stringent seismic regulations, in a city twice destroyed by earthquakes. In the end, a hybrid solution prevailed: the reinforced main auditorium houses a multifunction arts hall, while a new foyer replaces the Soviets’ glass-fronted box.

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The rear of the building (4) houses a multiuse hall (5). Photos © Laurian Ghinițoiu

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Replicating the original’s dimensions—although wrapping farther round on the northern side to accommodate new technical spaces—the replacement foyer as well as its lateral wings house a cafeteria to the south, a small exhibition gallery to the north, and forthcoming upstairs spaces that will include a learning center and a rooftop restaurant. With its exposed metal ceiling structure, the soaring main hall has the quasi-industrial feel common to many contemporary arts spaces and is intended to accommodate all Tselinny’s principal activities, from installations, film screenings, and happenings to more conventional exhibitions of painting, photography, and sculpture. Below, an enlarged basement contains restrooms and a coat check.

Other interiors are lined with metal panels. Photo © Laurian Ghinițoiu

In contrast to the blank canvas of the reconditioned auditorium, the foyer and its wings concentrate all the symbolic charge of the Tselinny project. Where steps separated the movie theater from the ground, the cultural center is entered at grade, a gesture of accessibility both literal and metaphorical. Given the visual clout of the Soviet facade, pressure was on to design a main elevation of equal impact. As Khan recalls, inspiration came from a trip to the steppe, when he and Aitayeva watched clouds descend along the vast horizon toward the ground. “My instinct was to try to recreate the feeling I’d had that day, of Tengri [the traditional Kazakh sky god] meeting Umay [the earth mother],” he explains. After the initial idea—a 45-degree-tilted, sky-reflecting glass facade—proved too technically challenging, the architects adopted a more classic response: in front of full-length glazing, an undulant screen of vertical steel fins forms what they hope will be interpreted as a gently billowing cloud. “Walking through the cloud is a purifying process,” says Khan. “You enter in a different state of mind.”

At dusk, the foyer’s preserved sgraffito is visible from the street. Photo © Laurian Ghinițoiu

Purifying or not, the fins, which read as a continuous mass when viewed obliquely, are spaced widely enough to recreate the original transparency when seen from Kabanbay Batyr Street, allowing a glimpse of another noted feature of the movie theater: a sgraffito mural by artist Evgeniy Sidorkin (1930–82). Believed lost, the damaged artwork, which depicts figures from Kazakh folklore, resurfaced during demolition and was carefully removed for incorporation into the new foyer. Restored with Charter of Venice truthfulness, it brings much welcome character to the blankly monumental space, which is dominated by the blanched expanse of a luminous ceiling. Sidorkin’s ghost also haunts the lateral facades, where concrete cladding panels feature molded hollows that, as well as recalling ancient petroglyphs in southern Kazakhstan, derive their forms from a copy of his mural that adorned the building’s exterior after the multiplex revamp.

Petroglyph-like niches on the facade create shadows. Photo © Laurian Ghinițoiu

Unlike the Almaty Museum of Arts, whose architecture, programmatic approach, and Jura limestone are pure European imports, Tselinny tried hard to remain rooted in the local context. Entirely built by Kazakhstani contractors, whom Khan and Aitayeva pushed beyond their customary process, the renovation project also called on NAAW, a young Almaty architecture firm, to fit out the cafeteria and the forthcoming restaurant. In a city not noted for its contemporary design, might this auspicious new institution prove as beneficial to construction culture as it aims to be to the arts?

Image courtesy Asif Khan Studio, click to enlarge.

Image courtesy Asif Khan Studio, click to enlarge.