Art Spaces Istanbul

A week or so ago we attended some exhibition openings, including one at Mixer, an art space in the Tophane neighbourhood of Istanbul.

With Sibel and Mehmet at the PV:

Something about these charcoal drawings caught my eye. They are by Güneş Bulut, 2012.

Then there was the opening on 30 April at Arter,

a very posh art space, according to Julie. It's located on Istiklal, one of the main walking and shopping streets in Istanbul. Matt Collishaw, of Blaine|Southern, opened here with his particularly dark visions of leprotic and syphilitic flowers, tri-dimensional imagery of staged bedroom scenes, Death Row last meal photographs in suitably dour Dutch frames on charcoal painted walls, projected images of death in Sudan and Viet Nam - all of a piece, this very extensive showing. On the fourth floor, however, a much lighter show of works by Volkan Aslan:

Today I finally went to Istanbul Modern,

a ground and lower ground floor structure with a cafe on the Bosphorus,

facing Asia and the Old City.

In a curious parallel to Tate Modern and St. Paul's Cathedral, one can see another ancient holy site, the Hagia Sofia (Ayasofya) just across the shining waters.

No photos allowed inside. But I did very much enjoy a short video work by Hale Tengar, Beirut 2005-2007 and an animated modern folktale, Examplary by Canan, using imagery of traditional Turkish puppets, collage, and drawing.