ART CITIES:Berlin-Memed Erdener
Memed Erdener (aka Extrastruggle) is an artist known for his work that direct references to the political atmosphere and history of the Turkish Republic. The introduction for his project Extrastruggle i(1997-) says in its introduction: Extrastruggle works on imaginary demands from imaginary customers. Just like a graphic designer designing a logo for a client, it designs logos for all communities under social pressure”.
By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Zilberman Gallery Archive
Memed Erdener’s (a.k.a Extrastruggle) first solo exhibition in Berlin, “Beauty of Bigotry” is on presentation at Zilberman Gallery. Influenced by myths, history of nation states and religions, Memed Erdener incorporates multiple genres of image-making in order to reveal corruption and contamination of regimes by also rethinking historical figures. Consisted of paintings on paper and canvas and objects with found materials such as keys in “1915 (Dedicated to all Armenians living in Turkey)” (2012). The exhibition engages discourse around the constructive and destructive aspects of the world as well as power dynamics with various references from Eros to Ottoman Divan poetry to contemporary leader figures. Time, being a recurring topic in Erdener’s oeuvre, manifests itself in the exhibition, mining the notion of authority. In his text, “Beauty of Bigotry”, accompanying the exhibition the artist creates a persona that embodies the rulers of the vast regions of the Ottoman Empire and The Turkish Republic from the beginning until now. In Erdener’s militarized world, amorph freak body parts transform into protagonists and generate fictitious arrangements that travel around various time zones. In the painting, “Devlet Eli” (The Hand of The State) (2017), an arm wearing a golden clock tapers into a hand with penis shaped fingers. The golden clock refers to the rational mind, recalling the well-known saying “Time is money!” Reminiscent of a tired man nodding off and pressing his weight on you in the public transportation, Erdener’s characters and objects such as “Baş Hırsız” (Master of Thieves, 2017) or the objet trouvé “Sin is Sacred” (2015) reveal an uncanny entity and poke the audience.
Info: Zilberman Gallery, Goethestraße 82, Berlin, Duration: 25/11/17-27/1/18, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-19:00, http://zilbermangallery.com
