"My Mountain of Heaven" Exhibition

Everyday Aesthetics in a World of Villages

In our urbanising world, the constant decline in rural populations means the traditional village can seem like a relic of past. But in some sense, we all live in villages— rural, urban, suburban … or digital. Whatever form they take, the small communities we inhabit and identify with are vital places in our lifeworld.

Join us in exploring through innovative digital experiments what the village can mean today. We want to hear about your village communities and your experience of village life.

What is it like to live in your “village”? How will your digital experiment represent, celebrate or perhaps interrogate the diversity of village life experiences?

As part of “Nomad 2024: The Infinite Sky” festival we invite you to submit a short digital experiment that addresses these questions for inclusion in My Mountain of Heaven, an exhibition to be held in Naryn September 18–25 2024. If your entry is accepted it will be exhibited alongside a digital project based on fieldwork recordings made by a joint University of Central Asia/UNSW Sydney research team exploring everyday aesthetics in the lives of mountain peoples.  

Exhibited in the same context, your digital works will contrast, challenge or perhaps connect with the fieldwork data to create a rich and multi-voiced exploration of the village in contemporary life.

Submissions should be a maximum of 10 minutes in length. Works that include languages other than English should contain English subtitles. Selected entries will feature as part of the exhibition.

Submit your work at seharnaz.janani@ucentralasia.org with subject "Submission: My Mountain of Heaven" by July 31, 2024.

Terms and Conditions

By making a submission to My Mountain of Heaven, as part of "Nomad 2024: The Infinite Sky", the participants acknowledge understanding and agreeing to the Festival Rules, Terms, Conditions and Guidelines as listed below. Participants agree and consent to that their work or any other materials that present their projects may be used and/or published by UCA as part of the digital and print event programmes or promotional materials as deemed appropriate by the Festival Organising Committee at UCA. The participants also consent to collection, processing, and use of their personal data by UCA for the purposes and within the Festival Rules, Terms, Conditions and Guidelines of UCA.

UCA reserves the right to make any necessary changes in the Festival Rules, Terms, Conditions and Guidelines or scheduling.

• There is no entry fee for submissions.
• The work must be entirely the original work of the participants. Entries must never have been published, self-published, published on any website or broadcast in any form nor currently entered in any other competition before September 2024.
• Entrants should be aged 18 and over. Entries must be submitted in the entrant’s real name.
• The work/s can be presented in any language but must be submitted with an English translation.
• Under no circumstances can alterations be made to works once submitted.
• The copyright of the entries remains with their authors. However, by submitting work, the artists grant the School of Arts and Sciences permission to publish their works online for one year from September 1, 2024. Permission to publish other submitted works online will be requested from the authors on a case-by-case basis.
• Submissions to be made via the online form available on website.
• Entries selected for exhibition will be notified by email by August 31, 2024.
• A selection committee will be appointed by the School of Arts and Sciences, University of Central Asia. Its decision will be final, and no correspondence will be entered into.
• By submitting work, entrants agree to abide by these Festival Rules, Terms, Conditions and Guidelines, and grant UCA all required consents and permissions as outlined by the Festival Rules, Terms, Conditions and Guidelines.