“Summer Collective II” @ Gallery Ilayda

Gallery Ilayda will host “Summer Collective II”, a multi-artist exhibition featuring some of the gallery’s most successful artists, from Thursday 23 June through Sunday 18 September.

Summer Collective II
Didem Yağcı, Diana, 136 x 108 cm, Eski kitap sayfalari üzerine mürekkep ve keçe ile karışık teknik – Mixed media on old (source: press release)

From the organizer:

The exhibition includes the works of our artists, Ardan Özmenoğlu, Atilla Galip Pınar, Aysel Alver, Barış Cihanoğlu, Caner Şengünalp, Damla Özdemir, Derya Özparlak, Didem Yağcı, Gazi Sansoy, Kerim Yetkin, Mehmet Turgut, Nurdan Likos and Özcan Uzkur. We are inviting you to visit our gallery that will be open throughout the summer.

Ardan Özmenoğu who had ‘’MADE IN ISTANBUL’’ solo show hosted by Osthaus Museum in Hagenin recent months is exhibiting her Turk Series in this show. One of the rare Turkish contemporary artists who impress with their uniqueness and original techniques, Ardan Özmenoğlu is renowned for her works that combine printing techniques with post-it notes, and her installations.

Atilla Galip Pınar, in his latest works, he reflects the anxious mood of the individual who is aware of his inevitability, solitude and captivity against the existence, by detailed and high energic compositions which are occures of figures, colours and forms that have been choosen meticulously.

Aysel Alver with her figures which are formed with paper mâché and finalized by collage technique indicate an image that exists amongst “most”s by surpassing boundaries of identity and non-identity. She investigates the interrupted process of modernization and enlightenment by focusing on the corrupted grasp of humanism and deformed moral and ethical values. By means of a psychoanalytic approach, these works aim to make viewers experience the loss of moral and ethical values.

Barış Cihanoğlu is participating to the show with an artwork from his Ash Series. Ali Gradiva Şimşek states with regard to this serie: ‘’In his latest performances that he created with an extraordinarily special technique, he’s making pictures on wood’s burnt and carbonized structure. Friedrich Nietzsche says ; ‘’You have to be ready to burn in your own flames, how can you renew yourself before turning into ash’’. Rebirth like the Phoenix. With the colorful oil paintings he performs on burnt wood, partially turned to ash as a result of burning, he refers to the process of re-existence from the ashes, and the ashes remaining from burnt wood is, the gray manure of rebirth…’’

Caner Şengünalp is an artist who walks on the boundaries of thought. Şengunalp exhibits an inconceivable transcendental adventure through his artwork. Through the use of natural materials he opens up paradoxical whirlpools between the texture of the artwork and the intricacies of thought. Şengunalp’s artwork allows humanity to discover the truth above and beyond history, anthropology and philosophy with his own artistic flair. ‘’(Meriç Bilgiç)

Damla Özdemir, attracts attention with her 3-dimensional digital collages. Marcus Graf interprets the artist and her new works as fallows: ‘’ New works, placed in a rather indefinite space, now, the depicted locations conceptually contribute to the pieces. This relationship between the protagonist and its environment points to the troubled connection between us and the world. In the end, the often strange figure-context-relation gives her latest pieces a slightly surreal character. The current series proves that Damla Özdemir’s artistic journey is proceeding very well. Besides this, the permanently developing contentual as well as compositional character of her work promises that we will see many more strong series in the futures.’’

Derya Özparlak, interprets her sculptures which can be seen at the exhibition as fallows ‘’I first came up with the figures holding balloons as an idea involving thought bubbles. Then these figures expressed themselves by flying against gravity with these balloons. I caught lightness both technically and conceptually by creating a contrast between the coldness and weight of the metal and the colorful and light world of balloons.’’

Didem Yağcı creates innovative forms by transforming her unique philosophical and artistic perspectives through her use of techniques and materials, all the while putting emphasis on the relationship between visual composition and color balance. With regard to Yağcı’s works, art historian and critic Assoc.Prof Marcus Graf states: “Didem Yağcı makes use of fabrics, pages from old books and natural felt. As her figurative compositions re-question and criticize existential issues concerning being human, her works offer more than just being visually pleasing.’’

Gazi Sansoy is interpreting new Faceless Series artworks that has started to work with different teckhniques: ‘’Basically, It was a bit an incidental idea that stemmed/occurred from color stains remaining behind the figures that I cut out to create the series of miniature. Later on, I noticed that I could create the contrast of color and composition between the classical and the contemporary by removing only the flesh in the Renaissance paintings that I liked so much and painting in pop colours. Then I thought that the images of Jesus, Mary, the apostles and mythological images had been depicted by the artists completely under the circumstances in that era (or made them to depict), that each one had actually been the imagination of the artist, namely the person, that made that painting and, therefore, those images had in fact not been and could not have anyway been real, and that they could thus be the paintings that would actually deserve the very name of “Shameless”… We can say that I have produced in the ensuing process, namely in these days, the new paintings of this series by not depending on the paintings in this sense only by emphasizing mostly the contrast between the classical and the contemporary…’’

Kerim Yetkin achieves transitions in texture by utilizing unusual techniques such as cuts, cracks and wipes instead of brush strokes. By making use of a way of narration that is at times simple and at times intricate, he wishes to pull viewers to the depths so that they can approach the essence. These reflections emerge in magnificent harmony, sometimes on the surfaces of large works, and other times in compositions made of many small works in which the relationship between the pieces and the whole is investigated…

Mehmet Turgut promises a new journey to the audiance with this new series while he is trying to search and figure out his soul mate after so many years. He interprets the works: ‘’I wanted to shoot all parts of a woman. Her elbow, her back, her head, her arms, her breasts… I started to shoot part by part. I was triggering the shutter without knowing why I was shooting. Then I said “I will create the woman in my mind”. I confronted a cocoon at last. I could not complete the woman in my mind, I could not give it the shape of a human being or the woman in my mind was not complete anyway.’’

Nurdan Likos is participating to the show with an artwork from the ‘’Things On My Mind’’ Series. In this serie, the artist, based on her own story, deals with the privacy / sins of a world that belongs to woman. Strengthened with the descriptions of the colors in compositions indicate that the thin line between life and death. Shortly, the artist tries to make the description of the world she herself lives in, in her artistic productions.

Özcan Uzkur introduces the viewer to the traces of fighting each other with the anonymous human bodies which are constructed by him. In Uzkur’s works, one can prominently see fiber and blood, which come together in order to compose the body, but instantly break up. The body dismantling at that very moment of union, utters thealie nation from it self, perhaps not ever being complete again.

The artworks on display will provide a diverse look at of Gallery Ilayda’s most successful artists till September 18th, 2016.


For more information, check out the official gallery page.

Monday – Friday: 11:00 – 19:00 (Summer Schedule)

+90 212 227 92 92
info@galleryilayda.com

Featured Image Source: Didem Yağcı, Diana, 136 x 108 cm, Eski kitap sayfalari üzerine mürekkep ve keçe ile karışık teknik – Mixed media on old (source: press release)

Hüsrev Gerede Cad. No:37 – Teşvikiye

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