The exhibition ‘Journeys With No Return' is curated by three curators (Peter Cross, Levent Calikoglu and Alice Sharp) from three different countries and focuses on the influence of Turkish migration on contemporary art. The curators have initiated the project without any institutional background though in collaboration with various institutions of funding and hosting in the three cities: Istanbul, London and Berlin. The first two parts of the project have n been realised in Istanbul (at Aksanat during the 11th Istanbul Biennial) and in London (at A Foundation), whereas the last part now takes place in Berlin.
The concept was inspired by the celebrated Turkish poet, writer and political figure Nazim Hikmet. Hikmet's poem ‘Angina Pectoris' is used as a reference point. The project focuses on the effect of Turkish migration, and inspiringly involves artists who do not necessarily belong to the Turkish Community. The selection of the artists has been made on the basis of the artists' personal migration stories: either they are currently migrants or are coming from immigrant backgrounds. The project ambitiously deals with the theme of migration over the last 50 years. A series of conferences, residencies and commissions are produced in conjunction with each phase of the touring exhibition. In total 16 artists (Nevin Aladag, Kiran Kaur Brar, Ergin Çavusoglu, Adam Chodzko, Jurgen Eisenacher, Margareta Kern, Melanie Manchot, Olaf Metzel, Mike Nelson, Olaf Nicolai, Denizhan Ozer, Maya Schweizer, Zineb Sedira, Asli Sungu, Nasan Tur, Clemens von Wedemeyer) from various countries were selected to participate, some of which were asked to produce new pieces during their residencies in Istanbul, Berlin and London.
RESTRICTED
One of the aims of the project is to celebrate difference in togetherness. Although the conceptual framework of the project and the activities are quite promising, the outcome proved to be quite unsatisfactory and doesn't fulfil its promises of approaching Turkish migration in its last fifty years by means of various artistic perspectives. The conference at the Goethe Institute, London was rather unproductive. Its subject matter merged into discussion of diaspora and immigration conditions whereby only the ‘Turkish' focus on migration and integration circulated. This disappointingly led to some of the works being read by the audience as artists who work under the conditions of the migratory suppression. Hence not leaving the space for the works to stand on their own and to produce their own catharsis. Nevin Aladag's ‘Raise the Roof' (2007) performance which can be solely related to music and dance, was sadly restricted by the curators as an expression of Aladag's being Turkish in a foreign country and at the same time a foreigner in Turkey because of her Kurdish background. And Asli Sungu's four-piece video work ‘Faulty' (2008) was chosen as only presenting vulnerable Turkishness dominated by the Germans even in her own household practice. Olaf Metzel's pieces are illustrative of the fact that the narrow terminology of the classification is not able to produce anything further than a discussion around headscarves.
Ergin Cavusoglu's precise three-channel video installation ‘Silent Glide' (2008-2009) evolves around a narrative of a love encounter and its defining conditions. The lovers live in a town dominated by a freighter's port and a massive cement factory. The dust not only covers the streets but also has a physical, emotional and sensuous impact. Nasan Tur's playful work consists of an installation of backpacks produced in 2006, which have been specially crafted for various objectives such as open-air cooking, instant public speech... The videos document the usage of these backpacks by an ordinary audience and how they produce content with the ingredients supplied by the artist.
PICTURESQUE
Melanie Manchot's double portraits bring together people who have been living far from each other by migrating abroad. The photographic quality and the expressions make them appear as rather dry illustrations. Kiran Kaur Brar, during her residency at Koridoor arts in Istanbul, has been finding similarities between the Punjabi language and Turkish. This has led Brar to make a documentary video about male hair salons. As Mark Nash commented in the conference held in London, Brar's residency does not go beyond the objectifying of picturesque representations of a culture. The double screen video comes over as a futile production of one's visit to an unknown geography and is more an anthropological practice than an artistic one.
Adam Chodzko participates in the project with two works: ‘White Magic', a slide installation in Istanbul and ‘Silent Pickers' (2009), a video installation in London. The latter is a conceptually dense work that demands the audience's patience in order to grasp the content. Chodzko, by allowing the people he has filmed to edit the piece, attempts to involve them in the production of their own images. Leaving the problem of integration behind, Chodzko seeks for the gaze of his subjects and asks to be gazed back. Mike Nelson's installation ‘Procession, process. Progress, progression. Regression, recession. Recess, regress' (2009) is a massive piece of concrete which could be the floor of a newly build apartment or the remains of an already destructed one. Nelson's piece is a prequel for a proposed piece that never got realised for the 8th Istanbul Biennial. He proposed to have a cast made in concrete of one of the wooden Ottoman buildings of the city, a sort of lost Kemalist modernism. Oscillating between a sculpture and an installation object Nelson's massive piece appears like a blockage in the continuum of the exhibition.
IN BETWEEN
Olaf Nicolai approaches the concept of the exhibition from the literary perspective. By producing two golden rings reading ‘Mundus Totus Exilium Est' inside and outside, he is searching for his imaginary partner to agree and associate with the meaning of the saying which stands for: ‘he is perfect to whom the entire world is a foreign land' - a quote from 12th century Hugo de St. Victor. Zineb Sedira's ‘Middle Sea' (2008), a video installation, is visually and conceptually a pleasing work. The piece takes place on a boat - a non-place place, thus taking its audience to a calm voyage to the unknown from the unknown. Clemens von Wedermeyer's video piece ‘Otjesd' (2005), explores this concept even further than Sedira. Wedermeyer has filmed a border crossing where the protagonists are continuously looped while passing through customs and passport control. As in an undefined in-between. Denizhan Ozer's installation exhibited both in Istanbul and in London is a construction of a kebab cookery in the form of pentagon where the portraits of workers are placed on ‘shish' (kebab sticks).
The works in the exhibitions vary in visual and conceptual production. Some very strong works are accompanied by poor ones which leads to an imbalance of the whole project. Neither the catalogue, which mentions only the recent curriculum of the participating artists, nor the conferences held around the project furthers the investigation of the effect of Turkish Migration. In other words, in contrast to its objectives, the project is an impossible mix of works, positions and stances. And maybe on that level, it is a journey with no return.
Fatos USTEK
is an independent art critic and curator and editor of ‘nowiswere'.
The exhibition ‘Journeys with No Return' started in 2009 in Istanbul, ran in February 2010 in London and is opened at the Kunstverein Tiergarten in Berlin in June 2010, concurrent with the 6th Berlin Biennale (June 11-August 10).
http://www.journeyswithnoreturn.com/content/exhibitions/london.html