Monitoring Desk
Istanbul’s Anna Laudel gallery has simultaneously launched two solo exhibitions by artists Belkıs Balpınar and Serkan Küçüközcü. “Micro-Macro” by Balpınar and “Un-limited Motion” by Küçüközcü focus on astronomy through arts of rug and landscape painting, respectively.
Balpınar’s artworks have been featured in prominent private art collections worldwide, including the former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, fashion designer Miuccia Prada and author Ignazio Vok, as well as institutions such as the World Bank. The artist is known to be the first name in Turkey to produce contemporary artworks by using traditional rug weaving techniques.
Balpınar’s latest show at the gallery features her new works that bring together astronomy and the art of rug. Combining the rug weaving method, which is one of the important heritage of the Anatolian culture, with contemporary art and science, Balpınar considers the micro and macro universes that move in circles and ellipses around themselves and others as a reflection of the movements in space. Inventing the “un-weave” technique in order to break the repetitive motifs of traditional rug patterns and add depth, the artist shows these universes, which consist of many elementary particles, stars and galaxies, on the rug weave with the most minimal drawings.
In her works at “Micro-Macro,” Balpınar shows visitors that the movements in the micro and macro universes appear in a certain order with a focus on the essence of our being. The artist investigates the theoretical and practical aspects of perception and imperception both as a scholar and an artist.
Noting that Albert Einstein’s demonstration of the fourth dimension, which humankind is not yet capable of perceiving, on a space in terms of time and speed affected her work, Balpınar represents the space with large spiral forms and shows the movements of orbits that exist within the complex universe in their simplest form.
With her designs, the artist offers the audience new perspectives and different ways of perceiving the world.
Küçüközcü’s “Un-limited Motion,” on the other hand, presents a collection of colorful paintings that take the viewer on a journey at Anna Laudel. While depicting natural spaces on his canvases to show his relationship with life and nature, the artist reveals the landscape painting as a tool of contemporary art. He also reflects the relationship of the outer world with our inner world.
The subconscious that sustains its role in daily life appears on a plane in Küçüközcü’s paintings, where he creates unlimited and timeless relationships. With the images that come to the forefront from his subconscious, the artist also points to the themes of childhood and innocence. Evoking the feelings of desolation and timelessness, his objects and figures that take their place in the composition by turning the reality of the space upside-down open the door to surrealism.
In all of his works, the concept of unlimitedness takes over. Whereas the works show the artist’s pictorial practice, moving from traditional to contemporary, they open up to the unlimitedness of the past and the future, imagination and reality, and matter and spirit.
Balpınar’s “Micro-Macro” show, which makes her curiosity in science and cosmology apparent, and Küçüközcü’s “Un-limited Motion,” featuring dreamlike landscape works, can be seen until June 10.
Courtesy: Dailysabah
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