Svetlana Batyreva, Autobiography

Svetlana is an expert on Buddhist and folk art. I was born in 1949 in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan. I went to school there for 6 years, and in 1961 our family moved back to Kalmykia. For me the trip felt as if I had acquired a new homeland. We moved to Kalmykia on the insistence of our father. My parents always considered Kalmykia as their homeland, but for me it was where I was born. From Alma-Ata we went to Mineralnye Vody, from where we flew to Elista on a small plane. The Elista airport was a little house in the middle of the field. I passed my youth in Elista. I graduated from secondary school No. 1 in 1966. Although I wanted to become a doctor, I could not get into a medical institute, because I got only 3 points in physics. At that time, the Chemical and Biological Department was opened in Kalmyk University, where I got enrolled instead. After graduation, I worked in the laboratory, but felt that it was not my cup of tea. I got married. Then I entered the Repin Institute to study ‘the history and theory of fine arts’. Although I already had children, my parents understood me and let me go to study. Under the influence of my father, I came to be concerned about the state of culture in Kalmykia. My father embodied his knowledge in his art works. I started my career working in the Picture Gallery of the Palmov Museum in Kalmykia. There I worked as a museum curator. Many works from Kalmykia had been scattered in the adjacent regions, including Astrakhan. Astrakhan sent some of its Kalmyk materials to the Kalmyk museum. All this had to be described and researched. So I started to work with Buddhist art. I even had to restore some of them. All these art pieces today are stored in our museum provided with description. My coming to Buddhist iconography was natural and it has influenced my life. I wrote my dissertation on Kalmyk Buddhist paintings kept in the Kalmyk fund. By studying Buddhism I came to folk art. Folk art has influenced Buddhist pictorial canons. For example, the standing Tsagan Aav. Kalmyk culture is a fragment of the Mongolian one. Being influenced by the cultures of neighboring peoples, including the Russians, Tatars, Bashkirs, and Nogais, Kalmyk culture has adapted to new conditions and it acquires only what it needs to survive.Sponsored by Arcadia Fund, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwi