The year 2024 was the hottest year on record. How the fight against climate crisis will take shape in the near future is likely to determine the center of political and economic conflicts on a global scale. Curiosity towards northern geographies and observations out there, which have played a major role in the development of scientific awareness about climate change, constitute the starting point of the exhibition “Northward“. Featuring works created by artists after their travels to northern countries, the exhibition includes recent works by Ali Alışır, Murat Germen and Ali Kazma, as well as Deniz Gül‘s installation inviting the viewers to consider ice as an object of contemplation.
“Cosmos” series was reflecting Ali Alışır’s desire to understand and explain the universe on both micro and macro levels. In his work at the exhibition, the landscape images he took in Iceland for research on this series merge with the dynamic figure compositions in his recent line of work “Hybrid Souls”. Produced by Alışır for the “Northward“, this new work seeks a mutual language between the artist’s series that present different facets of his practice of exploring the world we live in through the potentials of photography.
Murat Germen’s photographs taken in Ilulissat, Greenland, show cross-sections of the region’s stunning geography. The triptych photograph showing the ice mass known as Sermeq Kujalleq in Greenlandic language, also known as Jakobshavn Glacier, reveals the impressive surface of this geological structure in constant transformation. The masses breaking off from Sermeq Kujalleq, one of the fastest moving glaciers, caused the sea level to rise by 4% in the last century. The glacier, which is often a reference point for scientific research on climate change, was declared as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2004.
In his video “Safe”, Ali Kazma turns his camera to the Svalbard Global Seed Repository in Norway. The unique location of this repository, where seeds of more than one million plant species are kept, provides security against the loss of seeds in other gene banks around the world due to maladministration, mishaps, operational damage, reduced fundings, warfare, sabotage, disease and natural disasters. The care that dominates Kazma’s artistic practice is embodied in the video “Safe” with all its symbolic meanings and engraves in the viewers’ memories a solution developed by humanity against a dystopian destruction that could be caused by human activities.
Deniz Gül’s installation “Highness” is shaped by the desire to preserve ice as it is. The pedestal-like form of the cooling system designed for this purpose transforms the ice into an object of display. The glass cube around the ice surrounds it as if protecting a precious work of art. Gül’s installation, which looks like something out of a science fiction novel, asks viewers to think about ice with all its connotations, including efforts to reverse climate change.
Curated by İbrahim Cansızoğlu, “Northward” will be on view at Bozlu Art Project Mongeri Building between January 10 and March 22, 2025.