On May 6, an international scientific roundtable titled “Global and Local Discourses in the Visual Arts of Turkic Peoples” was held at the Azerbaijan National Museum of Art. The event was jointly organized by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Azerbaijan National Museum of Art, with the support of the Yunus Emre Institute and the Turkic Culture and Heritage Foundation. During the event, presentations were delivered by invited specialists from Azerbaijan, Türkiye, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan.

The roundtable was moderated by Khadija Ibrahimova, Senior Research Fellow of the Innovation Department at the Azerbaijan National Museum of Art and PhD in Art Studies.

Speakers at the event included Shirin Melikova, Director of the Azerbaijan National Museum of Art, Associate Professor and PhD in Art Studies; Nigora Akhmedova, Chief Research Fellow of the Institute of Art Studies of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan, Doctor of Art Studies, Professor, and Academician of the Academy of Arts of Uzbekistan; Erdem Akkurt, Director of the Ankara Museum of Painting and Sculpture; Aygul Mambetkaziyeva, Director of the G. Aitiev Kyrgyz National Museum of Fine Arts and Honored Cultural Worker; Samal Mamytova, Head of the Painting and Theatre-Decorative Arts Sector of the A. Kasteyev National Museum of Arts of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Telman Ibrahimov, Head of the Research Department of the Azerbaijan National Museum of Art, Associate Professor and PhD in Art Studies; Elchin Shamilli, PhD in Art Studies; and Amir Jadaybayev, Leading Research Fellow of the A. Kasteyev National Museum of Arts of the Republic of Kazakhstan and PhD in Art Studies.

The roundtable addressed the complex and multilayered development of the visual arts of Turkic peoples in the contemporary era amid globalization processes. It was emphasized that despite the expansion of international visual culture systems and intercultural connections, national-cultural memory, traditional ornamentation, folklore, and mythological thinking continue to form the foundation of the local artistic language.

Within the framework of the event, the interaction between global and local artistic traditions, as well as the processes of transformation and synthesis resulting from this interaction, were examined from a scholarly perspective. At the same time, the points of collision and integration between global and local discourses were comparatively analyzed, with particular attention given to the preservation and modernization of national identity in the context of the integration of Turkic visual arts into the global art system.

Javid Movsumlu, Chief Coordinator of the TURKSOY Museums Union and Head of Department at TURKSOY, together with Shirin Melikova, TURKSOY Museums Union Coordinator for Azerbaijan, presented TURKSOY Museums Union membership certificates to the Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum, Gobustan National Historical and Artistic Reserve, Nizami Ganjavi National Museum of Azerbaijani Literature, State Museum of Musical Culture of Azerbaijan, and Kamil Aliyev’s “Golden Carpets” Gallery.