Talks on Memory and Arts 2020
Hafıza Merkezi (Truth Justice Memory Center)
Co-editor | TR & ENG
The essays which constitute Talks on Memory and Arts 2020 are based on a series of talks carried out online between 16–25 December 2020 as the first public activity of the project on Memory and Arts in Turkey. Coordinated by the Hafıza Merkezi, the project aims to cast a look at today’s Turkey through the lens of artistic creations in an environment where the rule of law, human rights and democratic values are wearing out and non-governmental initiatives struggle with all sorts of threats. The research project, which focused on artistic creation in the fields of visual arts and performing arts from 2000 onwards, consisted of two phases: the first was the constitution of a selection/archive, and the second, its opening to interpretation. In order to allow for multiple readings, the productions included in the selection were open for interpretation by 15 academics, critics and artists from various working fields and debates were carried out within working groups concentrating on specific themes. These discussions were later turned into a series of talks which consequently turned into essays constituting this volume.
Authors featured in this book are Aslı Zengin, Banu Cennetoğlu, Banu Karaca, Begüm Özden Fırat, Dilan Yıldırım, Ege Berensel, Erden Kosova, Ezgi Bakçay, Nora Tataryan, Özlem Hemiş, Tanıl Bora, Turgut Tarhanlı, Umut Tümay Arslan, Zeynep Günsür Yüceil and Zeynep Sayın. Those who have contributed to this volume include Meltem Ahıska with the foreword and Lara Fresko Madra who interviewed the project team. This volume was edited by Eylem Ertürk and Sevim Sancaktar, designed by Salih Gürkan Çakar and translated into English by Baptiste Gacoin.
Ertürk, Eylem, and Sevim Sancaktar, eds. Hafıza ve Sanat Konuşmaları 2020. Istanbul: Hafıza Merkezi, 2021.
The book was published originally in Turkish ISBN: 978-605-70285-0-1
Ertürk, Eylem, and Sevim Sancaktar, eds. Talks on Memory and Arts 2020. Translated by Baptiste Gacoin. Istanbul: Hafıza Merkezi, 2021.
The English translation is available as an e-book ISBN: 978-605-70285-5-6
Contents
Foreword: Memory and Art: For Equality, Liberty, Justice and Peace
Meltem Ahıska | 9
Bridges, Chains and Ruptures
Erden Kosova | 19
“The Politics of Art” in Turkey in the 2000s: Karşı Sanat Çalışmaları
Ezgi Bakçay | 27
Violence, Memory and Art within the Context of the Right to Freedom of Artistic Expression and Creativity
Turgut Tarhanlı | 39
Histories of Ongoing Violence: Complicity and Implication
Banu Karaca | 61
An Essay on the Representation of Violence and the Possibility of Confrontation with the Past
Nora Tataryan | 69
Planning and Statufying Memory
Tanıl Bora | 79
The Body in Hope Slips Into Uncanny Spaces or a Praise of the Void
Zeynep Günsür Yüceil | 95
The Memory of Antigone
Özlem Hemiş | 109
The Possibilities of Memory and Posthuman Bodies: Techno-Monsters and Ghosts
Aslı Zengin | 121
The Time of Childhood: Home, Excavation and Memory
Umut Tümay Arslan | 135
Menstrual Blood, Hair and Needle: Constructing Testimony to the Self
Dilan Yıldırım | 165
The Memory of Death, the Death of Memory
Zeynep Sayın | 179
(My/Our) Fantasies, Archive and You?
Banu Cennetoğlu, Seçil Yersel | 191
The Art of List-Making
Ege Berensel | 199
The Outside of the Archive
Begüm Özden Fırat | 209
Bridges, Chains and Ruptures: Interviews by Erden Kosova | 217
Feyyaz Yaman: Outside the Framework | 218
Gülsün Karamustafa: The Memory of Transience | 230
Hale Tenger: Like the Backs of Foggy Windows | 236
Asena Günal: Under Close Watch | 242
Barış Seyitvan: In Spite of Everything | 248
Interview with the Project Team
On the Memory and Arts Research: the Present of the Past, the Future of the Present
Lara Fresko Madra | 257
Ayşe İdil, Enis Köstepen, Eylem Ertürk, Gamze Hızlı, Meltem Aslan, Sevim Sancaktar
Eylem Ertürk 