for artists, photographers, film-makers and musicians
Make something about a horse worth knowing
The Chaar horse needs people who can make the rest of the world look at a spotted mare on a mountainside and want to know more. Some artists come to the ranch and spend weeks with the herd. Others have never set foot in Kyrgyzstan and have still made some of the best work about this horse, from photographs and stories we sent them. Both are welcome, and we're open about what a partnership looks like, because so far no two have been alike.
Artists who've already come
This isn't a new idea we're testing on you. Artists have been making work about this horse for years, and some of it you've already seen. Here are five partnerships, and what came of them: some made in Kyrgyzstan, others from studios thousands of miles away.
painter and designer · UK
Alice Shirley
Alice watched True Appaloosa and couldn't get the horse out of her head. In 2017 she designed the silk scarf “Appaloosa des Steppes” for Hermès, with patterns lifted from Kyrgyz rugs and a spotted horse at the centre.
She drew the logo you see at the top of this page and gave it to us. In 2024 she painted a new Chaar piece live on her Instagram, and every cent of the sale went into building the ranch. She has since come to Kyrgyzstan to meet the herd, and a young horse is named Ottaway’s Tan Suluu, after her son.
Instagram @alicekshirley · the painting post
illustrator
Enikő Katalin Eged
Enikő drew a Chaar mare and foal, one pair set against the mountains and one against a village of yurts, in a bold, folk-print style that works as well on a mug as on a shirt.
Her designs now run across our shop, on T-shirts, hoodies and mugs, and every sale helps feed the herd. When she shared the pair with her 256,000 followers on Instagram, it brought the Chaar a wave of new attention. It’s also a way for people who may never travel to Kyrgyzstan to carry a Chaar horse around with them, and to start a conversation about it.
Instagram @nikoenikoeniko · the mare and foal post
illustrator and author · France
Marie Laure Fromenteil
Marie Laure illustrated and published Tchaar, cheval sacré des Monts Célestes, a book of Kyrgyz folk tales about the Chaar. It carries the horse to the audience that matters most in the long run: children.
Her soft pastel drawings also tell the legend of Tolubai Synchy, the blind horseman who could read a horse at a glance and chose a scruffy spotted colt that became a tulpar.
Instagram @pitema_pastels
visual artist, illustrator and animator · France
Myriam Sadat
Myriam has never been to the ranch. We sent her photographs and the stories of the horses, and from her studio in France she drew and animated a spotted Chaar horse walking across the steppe, with an eagle overhead, and shared it with her followers on Instagram.
It brought the Chaar horse to thousands of people who had never heard of it, and it worked for her too: a striking new piece, a cause she cares about, and an audience that followed the horse back to her. She is now one of our ambassadors.
Instagram @ama_equine_art_ · the animation post
film and photography studio · Kyrgyzstan
Studio 7-Nebo
Made with the Zenius creative economy fund, the film on our homepage and its photo shoot put Kyrgyz women in traditional dress beside the Chaar horses, in the hills and above the lake. Its pictures are the ones people remember and share, and they show how much a photographer can do for this horse.
Directed and written by Yntymak Abdyldaev and Mirrakhim Oposh, camera and editing by Daniyar Abirov, camera assistant Nurgazy Sydygaliev, costumes by Gulmira Kutueva and music by Balasagyn Musaev. Produced by Bermet Tursalieva and Munarbek Kuldanbaev, who had the idea together.
Also made work about the Chaar
Conor Woodman
Directed True Appaloosa, the documentary the whole association grew out of.
Léon Mitouard
Spent a winter on the farm and wrote a whole series about the horses, the hospitality and the quiet. His first dispatch
Two ways to work with us
Some of the work that has done most for this horse was made thousands of miles from the mountains. Come if you can, and if you can't, that has never been the thing that stopped anyone.
Come to the ranch
Stay at Chaar Ranch for as long as the work needs, follow the herd up into the mountains, and spend time with the people who know these horses individually. You work at your own pace rather than a group's schedule. How long, and when, depends on you and on the season.
Work from wherever you are
We'll send you what you need to work from: photographs of particular horses, video, the stories behind them, and answers to whatever you want to ask. Illustrators, painters, writers and musicians have all made work this way. A horse can travel a long way as an image.
What we're hoping for
Honestly, we don't want to narrow this down too far, because the ideas we'd never have thought of are the good ones. Broadly:
- Work you're willing to share, in whatever medium is yours.
- Something that helps people who have never heard of the Chaar horse notice one.
- A credit for the horses and the association wherever the work ends up.
- A conversation, rather than a finished proposal. Tell us the rough shape and we'll take it from there.
How it works
you write to us
Tell us who you are, send a link to your work, and say roughly what you'd want to make. A paragraph is plenty, and a half-formed idea is fine. We read everything that comes in.
we talk it through
We'll come back to you and work out what would actually help: a visit, or reference material sent to your studio, or something neither of us has thought of yet.
you make the work
Here or at home, at whatever pace suits. Afterwards we share what you've made, and it becomes part of how the Chaar horse is known.
Worth knowing
Nothing here is a fixed package
Every partnership so far has been shaped around the artist, so the practical details get worked out between us once we've talked. There's no form of this we'd rule out in advance.
The seasons decide a lot
Foaling in spring, the high pastures in summer, a hard winter. If you're coming, tell us what you want to see and we'll tell you when.
The ranch is genuinely remote
Mountain roads, limited connection, long days outdoors. Wonderful, and not comfortable. More about getting here.
The horses come first
The herd isn't a set. Some days the light is perfect and the mares have other ideas, and that's how it goes.
Tell us your idea
Fill in the form below and we'll write back. Say whether you'd want to come or work from where you are, or tell us you're not sure yet, which is a perfectly good answer. If you'd rather just send an email with a link to your work, that's fine too.