Matters of fact The exhibition features his photography installation titled “Soft As A Swan And Sharp As The Face of A Lake” (2010) and the video work “Rendering Rome” (2008) both to be shown for the first time in Istanbul, and the premiere of “Blow Up” (2011).
The title of the exhibition references a concept proposed by Gilles Deleuze in Francis Bacon: The Logic of Sensation, his book on Francis Bacon’s work: matters of fact. This concept, used by Deleuze in English in the original text, alludes to the system of relationships that manifests between Figures in the world of Bacon’s works and renders sensation the scene of a new fact, or rather, to the essence of this system. The works, in their entirety, emerge as a projection of the trajectory a phenomenon follows in its becoming. The works in the exhibition are reminiscent of the different dimensions we sense in order to see the blind spot beyond. Thus, matters of fact indicates the objective knowledge that is completely independent of the artist and is positioned within the body –and consequently- the soul of something else, and the tangible substance that remains.
Matters of fact presents an integrated and multilayered layout across the three floors of the exhibition space that draws the viewer into an aesthetic reality. This layout analyses the unique language of film and via this analysis embarks upon an interrogation of the functioning of visual culture. “Blow Up” connects the showcase displayed at the entrance to the space with the main space of the gallery via a visual axis. The work is based on two cinematic terms, fade in and fade out; and focuses on the concept found in cinematic language of one segment of space-time being replaced by another. In the metaphorical sense, the work may be interpreted as drifting into sleep and waking up in a new space-time context. The first part of the work which greets the viewer is a dreamlike image of a swan in a lake. In the main gallery at the end of the entrance corridor, there is a three-channel video installation. The swan is accompanied here by the striking image of two knives pouncing towards the fragile, transparent air bubble in a violent and desirous manner. This set-up, which implies the dynamic, tense and magnetic relationship between the feminine and the masculine, contains the energy of a blast in the face, the impact of a blinding wind blowing in from afar, and annihilation, violence and death.
“Soft As A Swan And Sharp As The Face Of A Lake” is formed of two sequences of shots flowing in opposite directions, forming the image of a helix. Here, the positive-negative dynamics that “Blow Up” focuses on are transmitted to a further dimension by selecting film stills and transforming each one into a stagnant image.
“Rendering Rome”, the work in the basement space of the gallery stands out with its editing; the editing process points towards a single image as the sole source of the inferences of the viewer. The main theme of the work is the symptomatic collection of images and their interpretation via an analytical process so that they form a meaningful whole within a grammatic structure. This systematic and specific style of editing that imposes subjective inferences on the viewer forms the artist’s fundamental artistic methodology.