Ayşe Erkmen, IRWIN
White Screen Black Hole
December 15, 2015–January 23, 2016
Ariel
Macka Caddesi 24
Narmanli Apartmani kat 2 daire 22
Tesvikiye 34367 Istanbul
Turkey
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Conceptual framework: Norgunk
Prepared by: Seda Ateş, Ayşe Orhun Gültekin
The presentation of zones of color as forms in themselves created one of the most radical breaking points in the history of art. In December 1915, exactly 100 years ago, 0,10. The Last Futurist Exhibition of Painting was opened in Madam Dobychina’s gallery in St. Petersburg, at which Kazimir Malevich declared that he had reached degree zero of all forms and gone beyond, by hanging his purely abstract and non-objective canvases composed of geometrical forms on the walls. According to Malevich, what he had done was to replace the art of sincerity with the art of truth.
Beyond these aesthetical and theoretical discourses, the most sensational work of 0,10 was Black Square, made by Malevich specifically for this exhibition, and unlike his other pictures, which were presented in the traditional way (i.e., hanging on the wall), hung in the corner where walls and the ceiling intersect in the manner of an icon. Such a corner was a place for the holy figure, not for the black quadrilateral painted on a white background.
Actually, the first sketches for Black Square had provided space for those who had achieved Victory over the Sun on the opera stage two years before; now, the work was announcing its own birth as a black sun in one of the halls of 0,10. Today, on the centenary of this birth and once more in a world of pain, we at ARIEL are tracing the light that was cast into us by the Black Square with our exhibition White Screen Black Hole with artists Ayşe Erkmen and IRWIN.
Internationally renowned Turkish artist Ayşe Erkmen participates in the exhibition with circular black canvases of varying size and a 12-minute video of the mutual interaction between hearts and colors. Slovenian artist group IRWIN participates with the documentary film of their famous 1992 performance Black Square on the Red Square, saluting the centennial of Black Square.
On June 6, 1992, between 2 and 3pm, the group Irwin and Michael Benson performed an artistic action BLACK SQUARE ON RED SQUARE in collaboration with N. Abalakova (Tot-Art), D. Ariupin, M. Breznik, S. Bugayev (Africa), Charles, E. Čufer, B. Edelman, F. Fleck, J. Harten, J. Kollerova, V. Kesić, I. Koulik, E. and V. Kurlandzev, G. Kurierova, I. Smirnova, K. Tschouvaschew, K. Turchina and D. Živadinov.
The 30-minute action consisted of the spreading out of a 22 x 22-square-meter space made of black fabric in the central part of Red Square.
*IRWIN, Black Square on the Red Square, 1992/2004. DVD video, 3:15 minutes. Based on the action by Irwin and Michael Benson (footage of the Moscow TV and Kinetikon Pictures). Edited by Igor Zupe. Courtesy Galerija Gregor Podnar.