Nasan Tur / Lewis Baltz

Galeri Manâ is pleased to present concurrent solo exhibitions by Nasan Tur and Lewis Baltz. While independent of one another, Tur’s Kapital and Baltz’s Sites of Technology series share a thematic focus on the cultural ideologies encoded in everyday life. Marked by formal simplicity and a minimalist vocabulary, each body of work is charged with economic, social and political implications.

Nasan Tur’s (b. 1974) exhibition Kapital features four new works that inform one another and create an evocative installation. The title work of the exhibition is a triptych featuring handmade sheets of paper formed from the 1957 edition of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital, Das Kapital II and Das Kapital III. A close examination of the matte surface reveals shards of the leather binding and individual letters from the original text. This minimal yet powerful work invites the viewer to consider the systems of exchange at work in our global society, a theme echoed in the other works on view.

The cyclical nature of the world we live in is underlined in the sculptural installation Once Upon a Time, fashioned from eight flags of nations that no longer exist (for example Yugoslavia, East Germany, Soviet Union) and is echoed in Countdown, an 18 digit clock that depicts the number of seconds left before scientists predict the sun will extinguish. This ultimate end calls to mind the passage of time and how each individual life is bound to the collective reality.

The relationship between individual ideologies and the global economy is expressed in Just Coke, a four-channel video installation that represents four brands of cola: Coca Cola and three colas that were developed as alternative brands: Mecca Cola, ZamZam Cola and Cola Turka, which have Islamic or nationalistic connotations. With his seductive popping forms and crackling sounds Tur reminds us that even the simplest gestures have larger implications and reveal existing systems of power.

Lewis Baltz's Sites of Technology series explores the impact of the information age on our world. Taken in the early 1990s, the photographs feature corporate workplaces where technical research takes place (Mitsubishi, Toshiba, France Telecom). A dystopian vision emerges in images of high technology and man working side by side with machines.

Baltz is one of the most significant and influential photographers to emerge in the 1960s. A key figure in the New Topographics movement, Baltz helped to redefine our vision of the American landscape and reveal the impact of the industrial world on our lives.

Galeri Manâ, located in the Tophane district of Istanbul, opened in May 2011. The gallery is a converted wheat mill that dates to the 19th century and features 400 square meters of exhibition space. The gallery, which takes its name from the Turkish work word manâ which translates to concept or meaning, was founded by Mehves Ariburnu and Suzanne Egeran.

Nasan Tur: Kapital
&
Lewis Baltz: Sites of Technology