Examining Environment & Ecology @ The 17th Istanbul Biennial
The 17th Istanbul Biennial is back in the heart of Turkey with an idiosyncratic approach. Curated by Ute Meta Bauer, Amar Kanwar, and David Teh with no specific title or theme, it showcases 82 international artists and self-identifies as a compost of sorts, fermented by the exhibition’s artworks, panel discussions, and workshops to further encourage dialogues surrounding the Biennial’s past, present, and future. As emphasised in the curatorial statement, “Rather than being a great tree, laden with sweet, ripe fruit, this Biennial seeks to learn from the bird’s flight, from the once teeming seas, from the earth’s slow chemistry of renewal and nourishment.”
Marco Scotini and Can Altay, Disobedience Archive, 2022. Installation view at Merkez Rum Kız Lisesi, Istanbul. Photo by Cenk Usel.
With the rise of ecological problems and environmental concerns throughout the world, dialogues concerning sustainability and the protection of environmental heritage play an important role in this year’s Biennial. Gallery Büyükdere 35 produced a participatory and site-specific installation titled Wallowland that aims to show the vitality of the culture of water buffalo herders in Istanbul that has been a part of the city for hundreds of years. Participants are invited to read research results that examine herding and its environmental impact, listen to songs written about the buffalos, and taste dairy products such as kaymak and sütlaç, yoghurt produced by regional producers.
Cooking Sections, Wallowland, 2022. Installation view at Gallery Büyükdere 35, Istanbul. Courtesy of the artists and 17th Istanbul Biennial. Photograph by Sahir Ugur Eren.
Cooking Sections, Wallowland, 2022. Installation view at Gallery Büyükdere 35, Istanbul. Photo by David Levene.
The transformation of the gallery space into a shop serves to reach a new audience, not only one filled with art enthusiasts but, rather, also one that engages local shoppers interested in purchasing dairy products. This perspective has the power to connect with a more diverse audience rather than the usual Biennial visitors. Moreover, tasting the products of regional producers reaches different senses and augments the audience’s understanding of the process of dairy production in Istanbul. This further enhances discussions of environmentalism and opens a forum for the sharing of ideas. Inside the Biennial, Wallowland, Cooking Sections directs the audience’s attention to the preservation of culture and aims to yield continued conversations while promoting the new annual Water Buffalo Festival, a yearly event that will preserve the existence and heritage of herders and buffaloes in Istanbul. Planned activities of the festival include concerts, hikes, and children’s workshops centred around the herders’ environment.
An installation by Carlos Casas in Yaklaşım Tüneli as part of the 17th Istanbul Biennial. Courtesy of the artist and the 17th Istanbul Biennial.
The Yaklaşım Tunnel, near Istanbul’s central Taksim square, hosts a site-specific installation titled Cyclope by Carlos Casas. Constructed as part of the envisioned subway system of Istanbul, the 200-meter-long Yaklasim Tunnel is currently used for exhibitions and art gatherings. The installation creates the opportunity for Biennial viewers and locals to visit this marginalised, repurposed space, with Casas taking major inspiration from Mussolini’s experiments in the 1930s that examined turbulence, fluid dynamics, and friction on an old aerospace research base. In Cyclope, the artist focuses on sensual discoveries in relation to heritage and the ecological and physiological effects of humankind on the earth. These effects could be understood as experiments as well as long-term ecological interventions via government policies or the relentless behaviour of citizens within the environment. The installation uses both visual and sonic arrangements to make the audience feel as if they are in the basement of an army base. Further, the gloomy air and disruption of sight could be understood as reflecting the devastation these experiments and research had on the environment. By blending blue and red colour sectors with powerful base sonic waves created by the artist, Casas constructs a new experiment in the hopes of probing viewers to think deeply about the environment that humans continue to damage.
Biennial hotspot Merkez Rum Kız Lisesi, an old high school for Greek students in the late 19th century that still preserves the aura of a classroom with its blackboards, wooden desks, and Atatürk pictures, hosts video works titled Disobedience Archive by Marco Scotini and Can Altay. Protests around the world defending human rights, LGBT rights, and freedom of speech are explored in the Biennial. These video works focus on the importance of social movements, their stances against oppression, and their influence on the public. Disobedience Archive examines these protests through an artistic lens while simultaneously evolving with new social problems and their aftermath.
Utilising the old school and displaying the work on various screens that are arranged on blackboards and desks serves to remind the audience of the learning curve that is often experienced when implementing social change, as well as demonstrating the causes and effects of disobedient gatherings and demonstrations that have changed the course of history in many nations. The choice of location for the work is also a nod to the tumultuous events of oppression that Greek citizens endured in Istanbul back in the 1950s. Then, because of allegations about Greek Turkish citizens’ wrongdoings, many houses, schools, and sacred places were damaged by protesters. Riots affected many other minority groups’ lives and their property. By showcasing this work in the school, the artist embraces Turkey’s past and its valuable minority communities.
The Çinili Hamam, one of the more remarkable spaces of the Biennial, was designed by the famous Ottoman architect Mimar Sinan in the 16th century. The decorative dome provides the space with flawless acoustics, paired with colourful tiles that enhance the effects of light and shadow within the space. In the Ottoman Empire, Hamams were social meeting spots for men and women where they would simultaneously bathe and discuss politics and their lives and experiences. For this year’s Biennial, the audience has the opportunity to see two artists’ works inside this historic space before it reopens in 2023 after a major 12-year restoration to continue its original purpose as a meeting place.
Renato Leotta’s multimedia work Concertino per il mare invites the audience to experience a sound installation accompanied by an archive from a water plant in the Mediterranean. The work can be seen as a commentary on the world’s current environmental crises and serves as a reflection of the ecological condition of the sea, particularly the Mediterranean. While the sound experience echoes with the acoustics provided by the architectural elements of the Hamam, the plants are encapsulated in glass to enhance the play of light and shadow in the Hamam’s design.
Further, Taloi Havini’s Answer to the Call is a multifaceted composition that explores oceanic hymns, sonar sounds, and the artist’s own interpretation of his experience in Oceania. The work manifests itself as a call and response for the Indigenous people living in that region. Sounds sans dialogues float in waves and submerge the visitor in the consciousness of the ocean.
Both Leotta’s and Havini’s works utilise the Hamam’s acoustics to enhance the audience’s viewing experience of the works, however, Leotta’s are much more comprehensive and perceivable by sight and sound when compared to Havini’s. Using extensive ecological research to produce the installation in collaboration with composer Federico Bisozzi and architect Giuseppe Ricupero, Leotta’s three-act concert specifically developed for the Biennial showcases this archived material and closely holds the attention of the viewer.
Taner Ceylan, Istanbul, 2022. Mehmet Emin Ağa Yalısı, Istanbul. Photo courtesy of Dadanizm.
Outside, Turkish artist Taner Ceylan’s exhibition titled Row Gently, Let Not the Moonlight Waken invites the audience into the realm of the artist’s vision through a mixture of Istanbul’s architectural past, the Ottoman Empire’s heritage, and the mystique surrounding the stories told by the city’s intellectuals. Exhibited in a Bosphorus villa, Ceylan showcases Istanbul as a human being with a fearless, self-loving identity portrayed in a glorious body. The sculpture symbolises the heart of the country and its people who have endured many struggles in their lifetimes but still stand, waiting for a new journey to come.
Taner Ceylan, Müzik Dersi, 2022. Mehmet Emin Ağa Yalısı, Istanbul. Photo courtesy of Dadanizm.
The artist’s use of nudity, mystique, and photorealism influences his new works, like Müzik Dersi, which were mostly produced during the pandemic. Although the paintings that depict the Ottoman lifestyle in Istanbul include historic references such as fashion, architectural style, and symbols, various figures that the artist depicts inside Ottoman Palaces mix reality with the artist’s daydreams. In Müzik Dersi, Ceylan presents a scene where a half-naked musician lies dead while a white horse is standing beneath the dark clouds, pompous and elegant. Did the musician play his music in order to tame the horse? Did it result in an adverse reaction, killing him instead? What is clear is that the incident happens inside an Ottoman Palace, surrounded by Ceylan’s imagination.
Taner Ceylan, Yarah Asker, 2022. Oil on canvas, 130 x 97 cm. Photo courtesy of T24.
In Yaralı Asker, when translated means “wounded soldier,” we see a young army officer who, perhaps, has been to the war and returned without any physical injury but an invisible aching heart. Holding a white flower could symbolise the possibility of a reunion with a lover or represent a farewell. The dominant use of monochromatic hues gives Ceylan’s paintings a secretive characteristic that could hint at the case of Yaralı Asker, the untold stories of Ottoman officers, and the streets of Istanbul. Ceylan explains his use of a muted colour palette as a detraction from colour and shadow, instead putting the spotlight on the story.
The Old City of Istanbul. Photo by Sahir Ugur Eren. Courtesy of Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts.
In an age of consumerism, fast-changing approaches and short-lived practices in art, politics, and other various disciplines, the 17th Istanbul Biennial, according to one of its curators Amar Kanwar, gives the audience “Another way to think, another way to say” that could support developing, long-lasting, sustainable ideas. Empowerment of local communities, long-term transformative projects, and searching for tranquillity in life’s chaos emerge as the fundamentals of this year’s exhibition. From a local standpoint, in Turkey, where freedom of speech is suppressed, the media is censored, and human rights are violated, this Biennial could bridge the gap between environmental consciousness, the power of justice, and the protection and preservation of culture.
The 17th Istanbul Biennial is on view throughout the city through 20 November 2022.
Cenk Usel
Contributing Writer, MADE IN BED