‘Next Queer’ Exhibition in İstanbul

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Kaos Gay and Lesbian Cultural Researches and Solidarity Association (Kaos GL) is organizing a special exhibition for its 20th foundation anniversary in 2014. The exhibition at ARK Kültür (ARK Culture) in Cihangir, İstanbul begins on December 26 and remains open until February 7, 2016.

The exhibition created under curatorship of Övül Durmuşoğlu and assistant curatorship of Aylime Aslı Demir will have its special opening night on Saturday December 26 at 6 p.m. to meet art-lovers, and homophobia and transphobia opponents.

Following the opening, after 10.30 p.m. a party will take place in Rod 11 Bar accompanied with performances of DJ The Away Days ve Mind Shifter.

Artists participating on the exhibition where works of art published on the Kaos GL are exposed, are as follows: Ahmet Öğüt, Alper Şen & Özge Çelikaslan, Canan, Erdem Taşdelen, Erinç Seymen, Fulya Çetin, Gökçen Cabadan, Gözde İlkin, İstanbul Queer Art Collective, Melanie Bonajo, Metehan Özcan, Nilbar Güreş, Oktay İnce, Pauline Boudry & Renate Lorenz, Susanne M. Winterling.

“How do we imagine our future ? And what kind of present, vital to build this future?”

The call for the exhibition by Kaos GL is as follows:

“How do we imagine our future ? And what kind of present, vital to build this future?

“What is it indeed that we expect in this life? Autonomy, equality, visibility, capable of loving fearlessly and of feeling free to desire, imagining another possible future. Any element within LGBTİ culture could be simply normalised today as a marketing and branding instrument within the system we live. The fighting for living together could be easily reduced to a matter of social acceptability through societal norms on the other hand. That is why it is necessary to be able to imagine a liveable life without excluding anyone with whom we have struggled together so far. Without ignoring the norms that have leaked between us, but thinking over them again in a transgressive way.

“Because we are ‘not yet queer’. Thus, we cannot be normalised via that place that we haven’t arrived in. What we necessitate is to evoke things beyond merely acting as individuals, exposed by the capitalistic vision. As the late theoretician/thinker José Esteban Muñoz says, queerness is that thing letting us feel this world is not enough, that indeed something is missing. It is the longing, carrying us away beyond negative romances and stickiness to the present. If queerness means imagining another future now in the present, then we should make today more habitable according to this imagined future. What we need is a common breathing space. When we breathe together, we could imagine together. When we breathe together, we could see other possibilities. Future social bonds could be repositioned through a queer aesthetics.

“In order to provide a common breathing space everything began with house meetings. And here we are now putting together a house-exhibition, celebrating KAOS GL’s 20th foundation anniversary, to recall and expand these reclaimed breathing spaces. The exhibition melts artists who collaborated with KAOS GL magazine and the movement’s archive together; and hence, desires to create a new space. Then, we would like to share this environment with others by means of various talks, screenings and workshops.” (CT/DG)