What artists are doing now. Erkan Ozgen in Diyarbakir, Turkey
An inspiration and mutual solidarity project for the creative industries
In the current situation, clearly our top priority is to take care of our families, friends and fellow citizens. Nevertheless, while public life is paralyzed and museums, galleries and cultural institutions are closed, in many of us neither the urge to work nor the creative spark have disappeared. In fact, quite the opposite is happening in what is turning out to be a time that befits self-reflection and the generation of new ideas for the future. Although we are at home and self-isolating, we all – artists, creatives and Arterritory.com – continue to work, think and feel. As a sort of gesture of inspiration and ‘remote’ mutual solidarity, we have launched the project titled What Artists Are Doing Now, with the aim of showing and affirming that neither life nor creative energy are coming to a stop during this crisis. We have invited artists from all over the world to send us a short video or photo story illustrating what they are doing, what they are thinking, and how they are feeling during this time of crisis and self-isolation. All artist stories will be published on Arterritory.com and on our Instagram and Facebook accounts. We at Arterritory.com are convinced that creativity and positive emotions are good for the immune system and just might help us better navigate through these difficult times.
From his home in Diyarbakır Turkish artist Erkan Özgen answers a short questionnaire by Arterritory.com:
Are you working on any projects right now? If so, please characterize it in some words...
I am working on a new project for the exhibition titled Unflattening, curated by Soojung Yi, to be held at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea in June 2020.
The project is predominantly about the effects of ideologies and political polarizations in the war. It focuses on the effects of the Korean War on the new generation in the 1950s. Memory and memory…
Besides, I am currently working on a new project for the Busan Biennale 2020 (Jacob Fabricius was appointed as artistic director in July 2019).
But, as you know, the emergence of COVID-19 and its spread all over the world has deeply affected life.
I was in Sydney installing three of my videos for the Biennale of Sydney, titled NIRIN, and to attend the opening. After the opening, I was quarantined for 14 days upon my return. I am on the last day of my 14-day quarantine, in my room at home. I am not an artist who uses a specific place as his studio. I define my studio as every area of life. My projects are currently on hold due to the cease of life outside. I currently just watch movies, read things…
What is your recipe for survival in the time of virtually only bad news?
Resistance and hope have always been good for me. Any experience that does not kill, strengthens. It is necessary to resist to further weaken the domination of states, the power of the neo-liberal system, over society and nature. This is a process where art and culture and disadvantaged individuals or groups in society should be supported more. In the name of progress, or development, which has caused excessive alienation, societies have been able to see that neo-liberalism is lost. A virus that we cannot see with the naked eye, and whose resistance was very weak, has caused a major crisis in the system. It is understood that the epidemic actually emerged as a result of the deep deterioration of capitalism and our relationship with nature, with the increasing colonization of wild animals. It has not only just shown us bad things. COVID-19 has shown us that big factories that have not been working for days do not actually produce anything other than air pollution. By taking a break from capitalism, we have been shown that the world can recover.
What could we all (each of us personally) do to make the world a better place when this disaster is over? It is clear that the world will not be the same anymore. But at the same time, there is a magic in every beginning.
In fact, the world has not been in a good condition for a very long time. The current virus has brought everyone together onto the same ship, regardless of race, geography, class, or culture. I guess that is why, for the first time, everyone is experiencing the same tension and anxiety. Many artists and activists have always tried to emphasize that life is common and that we are going to the same place even if we are not in the same place. Artists should emphasize this further.
In this crisis, the state has coordinated programs offering aid for all: artists, smaller and larger companies. It is interesting. We have a rather right-wing government who dramatically cut social programs before the crisis, but now they are taking control of money to support everyone. Perhaps the understanding of “state” has changed. We are all a part of it and have to and will share (tax money) in times like these. Maybe, hopefully, it will create another understanding of democracy.
The art world (and the cultural sector) is one of the most affected. What is the main lesson the art world should learn from all this? How do you imagine the post-apocalyptic art scene?
I think I have started to see strong signs that geography is destiny. The artists in the country I live in are not supported by the government. They do not hide the fact that they are very uncomfortable with the existence of artists. As far as I can see from social media, the best thing the state has done is build large cemeteries in many cities to bury the people who will die from COVID-19. Every day, prayers are read from mosques so that the whole neighborhood can hear. Society is, in a great sense, in an apocalypse. I can see that the state does not think about society, and that businesses are taking the steps to survive. The state recommends that people should stay in their homes, but it does not mention how to pay for the rent, electricity, gas, water and food of the house. The tax you paid will not return to you. There are still people who have to go to work and avoid being fired.
Exhibition view. Erkan Özgen: Purple Muslin, Wonderland, Aesthetics of Weapons. NIRIN. Sydney Biennial 2020
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Erkan Özgen studied painting at Çukurova University and graduated in 2000, but he has chosen video installation as his preferred form of expression. His art focuses on war and pain and the scars they leave. Born in 1971 in Derik, Turkey – an area that has long been the scene of violence and unrest – he confesses that as a child he witnessed too many events that were not appropriate for a child to see. However, having had the opportunity to leave and settle in a calmer place, he has nevertheless remained in conflict-ridden southeastern Turkey, a place where there is never peace. Özgen has remained because he is convinced that the area needs contemporary art, and he has also remained in order to report very directly to the rest of the world about the current reality in the Middle East.
