2023
20 copies
Stamped and numbered
20 copies
Stamped and numbered
26×35,5 cm
10.2×13.7 in.
10.2×13.7 in.
24 Pages
Pigment print and letterpress
Fabric hardcover with black foil
Pigment print and letterpress
Fabric hardcover with black foil
“The Contest of the Fruits” by Slavs and Tatars is a multifaceted project that comprises various components, including an allegorical 19th-century Uyghur text adapted as contemporary rap lyrics, an animated film, an original rap soundtrack, a RISO print publication, and a reader from MIT and Haverford College with contributions from several writers. The latest addition to the project is a limited edition letterpress publication by Three Star Books, which features all “The Contest of the Fruits” lyrics in English, Uyghur, and Chinese, accompanied by large color images and a hardcover.
This Three Star Books’ publication reflects the artists’ penchant for blending traditional crafts with contemporary techniques, as is evident in the large calligraphic fruits printed with pigment print and black letterpress, and the lyrics laid out on a different color paper. The cover is adorned with fabric, marked with black foil, and each book is numbered with a pencil and is stamped with the distinctive logo of Slavs and Tatars.
About “The Contest of the Fruits”:
Slavs and Tatars have long been interested in the margins of empires, the limits of ideologies and the edges of belief systems. Perhaps nowhere more than the Uyghur region (aka Xinjiang, literally ‘The New Frontier’) does one find such a compelling if contested cross- roads of languages, identity and faith. Whereas for most of the Western world, Islam is seen as foreign and eastern, for China, Islam comes invariably from the West, one of the three Abrahamic religions.
Slavs and Tatars’ first animated film, “The Contest of the Fruits” is an attempt to look past the reductive, based on a 19th century allegorical text written in Uyghur that features thirteen individual fruits – from the mulberry to the pomegranate, the quince to the jujube – engaging in ribald rivalry. With its oral flourishes and highly performative nature, “The Contest of the Fruits” is perhaps the first Turkic rap battle, and the result of a syncretic linguistic, and ethnographic heritage that makes up Uyghur identity and culture.
Each fruit is composed from a calligraphic treatment using the letters spelling the fruit’s name in the Uyghur alphabet, in a nod to Hurufism, the 14th century science of letters, and the paramount importance of language both for national or ethnic self- representation as well as Slavs and Tatars’ oeuvre.
Uyghur is the only Turkic language still officially using the Arabic script. As one of the first sedentary Turkic peoples, Uyghurs have a long history of written literature and an important millennial manuscript tradition. Slavs and Tatars have worked extensively on the issue of language politics in the Eurasian geopolitical space, in particular among the Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples.