Aigerim Tazhi

Aigerim Tazhi is a Kazakh poet whose poetry impresses and will move you. The profusion of images Tazhi conjures up makes her poetry a compelling call to reconsider the principles behind her world of magic. In her collection Paper-thin Skin she sketches a miraculous world that nonetheless seems to be completely watertight. However fictional characters, creatures and landscapes may be, they are photographically lifelike from head to toe, each with its own self-evident logic. Scenes of everyday domestic life metamorphose into almost unimaginable surrealism. Her poetry is thus one of twists and turns; her poems are portals to places that could be anywhere around us. Everywhere, and yet, always just out of reach. Tazhi's poetry is one of a reversal of roles, a depersonalized narrative where the author's perspective is often missing and has been exchanged for that of perception. 'Work of stunning originality' (John Butler).