ART-PRESENTATION: Icons of Thinking-Images and Texts

The production processes of Modernist, Post-Modernist and Relational Aesthetics of Turkey is authentic and unique in terms of its geographical location. The artists who had been producing in the field of Contemporary Art had endured the drastic changes in politics, economics, culture and passed Modernist and Post-Modernist stages to produce paintings, photographs and three-dimensional works.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Evliyagil Museum Archive

The exhibition “Icons of Thinking: Images and Texts” at Evliyagil Museum brings 23 different artists from the Museum’sCollection, and invites viewers to think about these artworks together with matching texts. This exhibition is focused on the relation between the act of thinking and art production as the options of defence and resistance against an epistemological crisis. Especially the pieces within the frame of “Abstract Art” have chosen from the Collection. Sheets of texts that are prepared in the same size accompany the artworks. The texts are from philosophers and thinkers who had influenced the formation of art have chosen for the artworks in the collection, especially for the ones between 1940-1970 that leads Turkish Modernism into figurativeness, spirituality and intellectuality and for the ones whose artists are already deceased. Two generations of artists whose international way of thinking has interacted in the Post-modern process are invited to propose texts that reflect their own thoughts. The main connection between these artworks, produced with different views, aims and techniques by artists within the political, economical and social conditions they live in, is the existence of free thought against all the negativities of the system. If the making or art is to be defined as thought process, the transformation of thoughts into production, and finally the visual outcome, then when the artists are asked which one of these processes is more important, the answer should be the though process, which is essential for art’s evolution. The function of the process of thinking determines the attitude of the artist towards present stages of the system. Therefore, the two factors which are important in defining the artwork’s world of visual metaphor, namely, the though process that goes into the making of art, and the artist’s position with regards to this process, are complementary elements. On presentation are works by: Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu, Ferruh Başağa, Selim Turan, Nejad Devrim, Mübin Orhon, Yüksel Arslan, Burhan Doğançay, Seyhun Topuz, Osman Dinç, Kemal Önsoy, Canan Tolon, Ini Eviner, Mithat Şen, Kemal Seyhan, Ekrem Yalçındağ, Günnur Özsoy, Ebru Döşekçi, Nermin Er, Haluk Akakç, Evren Tekinoktay, Ebru Uygun, Seçkin Pirim and Can Akgümüş.

Info: Curator: Beral Madra, Evliyagil Museum, Turgut Özal Bulvarı 
, Şevket Evliyagil Sokak No: 1, Incek, Ankara, Duration: 17/3-30/12/18, Days & Hours: thu-Sun 11:00-17:00, www.muzeevliyagil.com