Since the 1930s, reinterpreting the Stalinist formula “national culture in form and proletarian in content,” historians have described the birth of art in the Soviet republics as a process for the emergence and formation of the so-called “national schools”: painting, music, architecture, etc. Moreover, the characterization of “national” and “non-national” artists, i.e. artists, belonging or not belonging to the titular nations that comprised the Soviet Union, was vested with different semantic functions; and these artists themselves played different social roles. The purpose of the «national artist» was considered to be a direct expression of “national art,” whose voice was regarded as authentic and synthetic. The role of “non-national artists” remained ambivalent and uncertain, although their contribution to the building of a number of “national cultures” was not only significant, but sometimes decisive. This article reflects on the different perceptions of “national” and “non-national” artists, as well as the terms which were used to differentiate one from the other. The history of art of the Central Asian republics and especially Uzbekistan served as the material for this analysis. According to the main hypothesis of the article, the differences between “national” and «non-national” artists were rooted in the binary presumptions of Orientalism. However, in reality, the situation was not strictly binary due to several factors. First, there were groups of artists who could appear in critics’ descriptions as both “national” and “non-national.” Second, the concept of “national art” coexisted in parallel with the concept of “folk art,” which was often more inclusive. Third, the art of «national” and “non-national” artists appeared in a different scope, when comparing the descriptions of Muscovite and Central Asian critics. These and other discursive features deprived the situation of their apparent dichotomies.