Suspended

September 6, 2019 – November 2, 2019
The gallery is open Monday to Saturday, 10:00 to 19:00

Pi Artworks Istanbul, Kemankeş Karamustafa Paşa Mahallesi, Mumhane Caddesi No. 48, Beyoğlu

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Pi Artworks Istanbul presents Suspended, a solo exhibition by the artist İz Öztat. Through this exhibition, the artist reflects on the current social context, where agency in public space is suspended, commenting on the interrelations between the subject and power.

İz Öztat’s practice engages with diverse forms and media defined by her research on the return of the suppressed past, tracing what has been lost, and negotiating official narratives through the possibilities of fiction. Collective processes are also central to her practice. The artist has been working in collaboration with Zisan (1894–1970), who appears to her as “a ghost and alter ego” since 2010.

Suspended, the video after which the exhibition is titled, presents a collaboration between İz Öztat and Ann Antidote, portraying a scene of suspension. As a response to freedom of expression being suspended in public sphere, Öztat explores being a body without agency through her own performance.

At the time when the artist felt the impossibility of coping with the suppressive atmosphere, she resorted to articulating a language through geometric abstraction in her exhibition.