Project Archive: http://here-there-abroad.blogspot.com/
29.09 – 05.10.2008 rum46 Aarhus, Denmark
http://www.rum46.dk/

Artists: Asli Sungu, Canan Senol, Erinc Seymen, Esra Ersen, Isil Egrikavuk, Isidora Ficovic, Nevin Aladag, Sefer Memisoglu, Solmaz Shahbazi

Here..There..Abroad.. has been realised as video days in Germany – Stuttgart and Berlin- by the invitation of ifa (Institut Fur Auslandbeziehungen) and have hosted 11 video screenings and a performance by Turkish artists. In Rum 46, Here..There..Abroad.. will be realised as an exhibition hosting nine positions which relate to each other and to the concept of the exhibition on various levels. Rum 46 will be hosting six video screenings, an installation, an artist talk and a performance by artists who are related to Turkey. (i.e. have born in Turkey or have produced in Turkey, have lived or living in Turkey…)

Here..There..Abroad.. is a group exhibition based on unique presentations of each work and each position. The experiencing of each work will be a priority defined through the setting in the space and the program. Each work will be shown once – except the solo installation by Isidora Ficovic- and at a particular time. The audience will be expected to see the works from beginning to end and to participate in the evaluation of those artistic practices. Additionally, the exhibition is structured around speeches that will be held by the curator and the question and answer sessions that will be opened after each screening / presentation. The talks that will be held will be on the concept of the exhibition and the position of each work in the exhibition, its relation to the concept and other works. The overall structure is formed with the tendency of triggering a possible dialogue of which the concept posits to and of which the issues that will be evoked throughout.

Here..There..Abroad.. is a gathering of various perspectives and standings of artists who are reflecting upon their today. The different positions of the contemporary artists have a sort of correspondence to the space they reflect upon. The artists realize themselves and their productions respectively, as the breadth of interest in space is matched by the breadth of its spatialization. In social theory and post-modern literary criticism, spatial metaphors have become a predominant means by which social life is understood. ‘Theoretical spaces’ have been explored, mapped, charted, contested, de-colonized, and everyone seems to be ‘travelling’ under the influence of epochs of simultaneity, juxtaposition, and the places near and far, side-by-side and dispersed. The internationalisation of concepts and discourses has a function of producing closures and distances. The understanding of global in the context of local and the local in relation to global not only produce multiplicities but also lead to singularities in the course of meaning and attribution.

Here, there, abroad is a tricothomy of positioning. For to grasp certainty of where one stands, one shall define, where is here or what is abroad. The reference point is not only needed to clarify the geographical position but also enables starting up of a dialogue or discussion. Thus Turkey stands out as the reference of the exhibition. Not as a totality or as a country as such but by the variety of projections upon, towards, out of that specific geographical entity. Therefore, the exhibition is not a representation of a nation but of a selection of representations of today’s socio-political, cultural circumstances.

HERE..THERE..ABROAD aims to underline the permeable borderline between here and there, between there and abroad. A proposal of inter-changeability of structures for a better understanding of the self, of the other and of we…

Moreover Here..There..Abroad will be hosting special projects that will be realised for rum46. Nevin Aladag will realise a special performance, Canan Senol will give an artist talk, Isidora Ficovic will be realising a publication for take away for the audience which is related to her video piece positioned as an installation.