Kırgızistan'da "Yeni" bir mimari gelenek inşa etmek: "Manas ayılı" örneği

Kyrgyzstan experienced a very critical moment during the transition from the Soviet Union to the newly independent republic. Despite being rooted in the rich history of great civilizations and cultural traditions, there was an urge for the new national identity, which would unite people in Kyrgyzstan. In this context, the new national elites promoted 1995 as the year to celebrate the legacy of the Kyrgyz past. The mythical figure of the noble Kyrgyz hero - Manas, was retrieved to portray the primordial origins of Kyrgyz culture and the epic tradition centered on him. It turned his image into a powerful tool to forge a new Kyrgyz identity in the nation-building process. In the same year, a governmental committee announced the design competition for the realization of an open-air ethnocultural park - "Manas Ayili". The winner of the competition, the Kyrgyz architect Dyushen Omuraliev supervised both the design and the construction processes in the project. The aim of this thesis is to study the discourse of Omuraliev, and in particular to focus on his attempt to transfer ethnic, cultural and mythical symbols into an architectural language. The "new" national architectural language expected to embody the values and ideals of the brand new Kyrgyz nation, and at the same time to herald the construction of the strong tradition to support the new national identity. The thesis attempts to analyze and to discuss the case study Manas Ayili and the approach of the architect in order to point out the number of significant connections with the architectural theories and bring it to the international level. Eventually, the thesis attempts to derive the process of "construction" or "invention" tradition by the architect, on the background of the complex political and social changes.