Kutluğ Ataman is an internationally acclaimed artist whose interest lies in creating “talking portraits” mostly of marginalized individuals, but essentially in capturing how people fictionalize themselves through language. In Mesopotamian Dramaturgies,exhibited at Arter until November 16th, Ataman has clearly moved away from solely presenting individuals as he did in his past works.

The body of works presented in this exhibition explores the limits of language, and demonstrates that even in the absence of language many stories are being told, resistances are being advanced, and cultural constructs are being reproduced.

The themes of Mesopotamia - the geography considered as “the cradle of civilizations” - and dramaturgy - the art of writing and producing plays - are merged to create a vast and ambitious collection of works that try to reclaim a complex history that presents a bottomless well of stories, histories, inventions and disasters. In addition, this chapter of Mesopotamian Dramaturgies featured at Arter has a particular focus on modernity and the ways in which ordinary people have appropriated modernization in Turkey. (The project is an on-going one and will extend to Syria, Northern Iraq, and Iran.)

Many of the videos in this exhibition were shot in eastern Turkey, close to the birthplace of the artist, and focus on how people express their imagined identities, and thus constantly make sense of and fictionalize their existence. For instance, in the Pursuit of Happiness, a peasant woman from eastern Turkey tells Ataman about her troubles of finding the right man, the problems in her previous marriages, how she lost her virginity, and the pressures of her family. Perhaps, her idea of marriage and relationship to men is a metaphor for Turkey’s dysfunctional relationship with the West and modernization, which have been forced into a static relationship since the foundation of the Republic. The West has often been thought of by Turkish politicians, journalists, intellectuals, and citizens as mutually exclusive with modernity. This piece clearly shows that this supposedly Western ideal of “pursuit of happiness” is appropriated by the protagonist and used to create a particular identity for herself, which she expresses in a garrulous but intriguing monologue. It is quite difficult to understand her at times because of the speed and manner that she talks in, but also due to the sound that gets mixed up in the exhibition space. In addition, the translation of her words sometimes fails to reflect the original version due to the impossibility of translating certain phrases and notions. This only strengthens Ataman’s suspicion of literal and cultural translation.

Right next to this work is English as a second language, presented as a two-channel video installation. Facing each other are two life-size teenage boys, one projected on the wall on the right and one on the left. They hold Edward Lear poems in their hands, trying to read them out loud. Even for a native speaker, the poems are almost undecipherable. English, the global language that supposedly connects us all, seems to fail to do the trick this time. The students do not only go through the trouble of learning English as a survival tool to be present and active in the global world, but they are also forced to understand the nonsensical limericks of Edward Lear. Positioned in the middle, the viewers find themselves in a ridiculous position of listening to undecipherable English and following these teenagers as they shuffle the sheets of papers in their hands, confused. It is crucial to note here for what purpose English is being taught, and how the language is instructed in class. Having an idea of how words are pronounced does not make a culture mobile or accessible, nor does it raise the level of education. It does not go anywhere beyond pretense and leaves the students in a lost and puzzled position, and the viewers doubly so.

A few steps further stands the Column inspired by Trajan’s Column, which was erected to describe the victories of the Roman Emperor. However, Ataman’s version is a column that is mute, only showing portraits of Kurdish individuals on separate TV screens diversified by a selection of old and more technological screens. In this piece, Ataman points at the time that has passed, and the only column erected is a mute one representing the silencing of the people in southeastern Turkey. This is a column that reminds us how language and communication can fail, once again, exemplified in this piece by mute Kurdish individuals who have pleaded for years to have a right to speak, learn, and teach their native language, Kurdish. This silence can be interpreted as a form of resistance as well as just a yearning for the basic human need for speaking one’s mother tongue. As much as silence can be seen as passive, it also allows for an active projection of ideas, thoughts, and stories.

Stories can ground one, as well as uproot and shake the notion of truth as in the fantastic mocumentary Journey to the Moon. This groundbreaking work appears to tell the story of a historical event that took place in an eastern village in Turkey during an election campaign in 1957. The villagers, having been moved by the speech of a politician, want to be a part of this mass modernization process and try to go to the moon by transforming a minaret into a spaceship. The black and white footage, as if found in archives, and the stop-motion photography technique used in the film gives the story an air of truthfulness even though the narrative was written by the artist. Interviews with leading academics, journalists, and scientists in color add to the validity of the events, leaving the audience in awe and confusion as to the realness of the incident. Thus, in this work, Ataman, once again emphasizes his belief in the fake construct of what we call history. The influence of the interviews also makes one question authority and how knowledge can be manipulated when used in certain manners. The film is presented as a two-channel video piece in this exhibition, which unfortunately takes away from the power of the narrative.

The artist’s latest work Mayhem, which was shot in Argentina at the Devil’s Throat, has multiple screens and projections of gushing water on the walls of the exhibition space. The cleansing and destructive power of water symbolizes the force of change. When applied to the Mesopotamian geography, this water, which originates in Argentina, loses its geographical significance. By decontextualizing it, Ataman emphasizes cultural constructions around nature and natural phenomena. He also points at the passing of time and the change that occurs in a particular geography. Sometimes, we are too absorbed by the present time and forget that once there was no nationalism, once we were a hunter-gatherer society, once pagans ruled the Mesopotamian territory…

In this series, which Ataman initiated in 2009, what strikes the viewer most is the balance, or the imbalance, between the “talking portraits” and mute ones. The artist almost suggests that lingual and cultural translation is impossible at times, depending on the context and the force behind it. The impossibility of translation, in Ataman’s view, is a reflection of the difficulties in transcending the dualities that are imposed onto people who are usually viewed as one single mass, belonging to one group or the other. By exposing personal stories, Ataman tries to explore the area between what is very personal and stereotypically societal. Hence, the artist brings out all that is controversial and thus human. Mesopotamia is a great example of that due to the very many ways its history and geography has been imagined and treated throughout the ages. In this regard, Mesopotamia offers a platform for the audience to revisit historical and cultural constructs that have shaped individuals’ and societies’ understandings of the world at large.

If interested, the viewers can watch the 222-minute documentary entitled Kutluğ Ataman, directed by Metin Çavuş, focusing on Ataman’s artistic practice with fragments from his works, and commentaries by curators, critics, and the artist himself. The film is screened twice a day at 11:00am and 02:00pm on the ground floor.

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ARTER - Space for Art; İstiklal Caddesi No. 211 Beyoğlu; P: (0212) 243 37 67