Women and Weaving Identity: Alvina Shpadi and Olga Joldasova’s Cultural Canvas

Abstract

This article investigates the intersection of gender, cultural memory, and applied arts in contemporary Karakalpak visual culture, with a focus on two prominent women artists: Alvina Shpadi and Olga Joldasova. Drawing from my master’s thesis conducted at the I.V. Savitsky State Art Museum, I explore how these artists use textile, embroidery, ceramics, and mixed media to visually express female identity, ethnic memory, and spiritual resilience. Through a qualitative methodology integrating visual analysis, symbolic interpretation, and ethnographic observation, I examine how their art reflects and reinvents Karakalpak womanhood. Shpadi’s abstract and spiritually infused works reinterpret traditional ornamentation with symbolic color schemes, while Joldasova’s narrative pieces evoke everyday women’s lives, mythic archetypes, and maternal rituals through vibrant decorative forms. Both contribute to a gendered preservation of Karakalpak national identity, particularly in a post-Soviet context of cultural revival. This article situates their work within broader frameworks of feminist visual culture, textile anthropology, and semiotics of applied art, while also comparing them to other Central Asian and indigenous female artists. The role of the Savitsky Museum as a cultural patron and archive is also examined. Together, Shpadi and Joldasova exemplify how applied art serves not only as craft, but as a cultural and feminist language of survival.