56.VENICE BIENNALE-CONTEMPORARY ART’S TRIAL WITH “DAS KAPITAL”

CONTEMPORARY ART'S TRIAL WITH "DAS KAPITAL"
The 56th Venice Biennale


Turkey's current political-economic conditions are emitting signals of a
rapid departure from democracy and entry into the dark shadow of fascism,
and one could say we are presently suffering a form of social trauma. Even
being blessed with the opportunity of working in the field of visual arts -
a field of sustainable freedom of expression - does not alleviate my fear.
However, we know that if I were to say that there are similar problems and
dilemmas in the field of visual arts, the field where one can be most
unique and free in a universe of relative freedoms (democracies), I might
not prove convincing for those who have not shed the optimism of the 1980s
and 1990s. With the opportunity provided by Okwui Enwezor, who has devised
a biennial concept that directly involves Marxism, I would like to touch
upon these dilemmas.
The production conditions of the visual arts vary according to political,
geographical, cultural and economic realities; and as differences between
possible and impossible environments increase, despite the idea that the
centre-periphery dichotomy has been condemned to history books, a
diachronic subject to the hegemony of the mainstream prevails. For
instance, the scale of inequality between female and male artists
throughout the period of Modernism was discordant with Modernism's
principle of individual freedom. Today, our minds are at peace as we
observe how female artists have come to the fore; however, considering the
fact that the members of Guerrilla Girls, as the group celebrates its 30th
anniversary, are reviving their discourses, the problem does persist to
some extent. The infrastructural gaps or problems in the education of
visual arts production during the globalization process of Modernism, and
the interferences of Neo-Capitalist goals in art production also form a
counter-situation challenging today's conditions of relational aesthetics.
The most significant examples of this are visible in art fairs; where the
visually pleasurable and attractive works of even the most radical artists
are presented to the market. Although art fairs and auction houses do not
openly state that works that will not put off clients are "tradable", this
does however define the criteria of profitability.
The Venice Biennale, described in the international press as the largest
exhibition event in the world, is a heterogeneous event where such dilemmas
reach their peak. The dilemma lies, first and foremost, in the great
tension the biennale causes for the 60,000 residents of Venice, almost half
of which are of the elder generation, despite the fact that the event is
becoming increasingly commercialized on the assumption that it brings in a
great income to the city. The biennales may be a source of income for this
small city with a water problem, yet the graffiti on the walls of the city
reflect the view of the city residents about "tourists"! (1)
For hundred and twenty years, the Venice Biennales have sustained their
function in a manner that has influenced all other biennials, as a platform
where the global "creative" population comes together with "the society of
the spectacle". This biennial, which was able to become an exhibition arena
for leftwing ideologies in the 1950-1980 period, beginning with the
"privatization" operation that began in the 1980s, has been adjusted to the
needs of "the global rich" and the culture industry that serves them.
"Pavilion", which in essence is a commercial term, and "national", an
ideological term that has lost its validity, forms a situation that runs
against today's visual arts theories and aesthetics. However, artistic
productions assumed to be "dissident", "political", or "part of the
resistance", installed within every palazzo that is available, and the
fanzines of the university students of Venice continue their existence by
coming to terms with this order. (2)
As the rightness of Marx's theory in view of the latest stage of Capitalism
has become a topic of discussion (3), Enwezor, with correct timing and via
the artists and works in his exhibitions, has set the spirit of Karl Marx
wandering throughout the biennale. Through this concept and strategy the
viewer is allegedly helped to learn more on Marxist approach to art and
culture.
What was Marx approach to art and culture? Douglas Kellner in his article
Cultural Marxism and Cultural Studies explains that Marx and Engels rarely
wrote in much detail on the cultural phenomena that they tended to mention
in passing… In general, for a Marxian approach, cultural forms always
emerge in specific historical situations, serving particular socio-economic
interests and carrying out important social functions. For Marx and Engels,
the cultural ideas of an epoch serve the interests of the ruling class,
providing ideologies that legitimate class domination.(4) While this part
of his interpretation of Marxian approach covers the current market
oriented function of the global culture industry as a tool for the
interests of the ruling class, the following part covers the benefit of art
and culture production:
Cultural Marxism thus strengthens the arsenal of cultural studies in
providing critical and political perspectives that enable individuals to
dissect the meanings, messages, and effects of dominant cultural forms.
Cultural studies can become part of a critical media pedagogy that enables
individuals to resist media manipulation and to increase their freedom and
individuality. It can empower people to gain sovereignty over their culture
and to be able to struggle for alternative cultures and political change.
Cultural studies are thus not just another academic fad, but can be part of
a struggle for a better society and a better life. (5)

Indeed, I would like to present three examples from among many works that
convey the processes and forms of production, labour, consumption and
capital in the global context and the Modernist memory of the world into
the biennial space:

Rirkrit Tiravanija has installed a brick-making factory in the Arsenale.
Bricks are available for 10 Euros each, with proceeds benefiting ISCOS, a
non-profit organization that supports workers' rights in China. (6)
Tiravanija points to the operation of the global economy and China's
position within the neo-capitalist order.

Maria Pappadimitriou, under the title AGRIMIKá (Why Look at Animals?) has
transferred to the Greece Pavilion a taxidermy shop in Volos, Greece that
sells hides of animals that live in close proximity to humans but have not
been domesticated. The human-animal relationship refers to the insurgents
and socially excluded of our time, and criticizes the capitalist order in
which rights are not valid for everyone.
Ivan Grubanov, who in his work titled "United Dead Nations" at the Serbia
Pavilion presents a striking installation by laying out the flags of great
powers such as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Ottoman Empire, Soviet Union,
German Democratic Republic and Yugoslavia, that no longer exist but whose
ghosts still continue to determine world politics, also questions the
function of the Venice Biennale within the context of Modernism.
Articles published in newspapers across the world right after the VIP days
generally pointed out the contradiction between the conceptual framework of
Nigerian curator Okwui Enwezor, which refers to "Marxism", and the global
rich, who form the primary audience of the biennial, the biennial's
incorporated business structure, and its over-the-top promotion strategies
and methods.
It is possible to broadly divide the works into two groups as well:
Metaphors of humanicide-naturicide (metaphors referring to the destruction
of humanity and nature) visualized in the works of artists from African
countries, and the dissident, striking, daring works that directly point to
contemporary problems in the pavilions of countries facing political-
economic problems such as Iraq, Iran, Greece, Brazil and Serbia. One of
the most provocative in this group was that of Christoph Büchel, the Swiss
artist of Icelandic-origin who converted the Santa Maria della Misericordia
Church, unused for 40 years, into a mosque under the title "Mosque". The
Icelandic Pavilion that hosted this work that challenged anti-Islamism in
the EU was being closed down as this article was being written.
In the second group there are works that trigger the desires of the society
of the spectacle and consumption in the pavilions of countries which live
relatively problem-free present their own world of imagination to the
society of the spectacle: Such as Sarah Lucas, who presents an erotic
Disneyland at the British Pavilion; Joan Jonas, who presents an esoteric
world of fairy tales at the United States Pavilion; and Fiona Hall, who
presents a "cabinet of curiosities" as neo-orientalist kitsch at the
Australian Pavilion, designed as a new black cube… The works of these three
women artists evoke admiration, however, they also make one think that they
place quite a great distance between themselves and global realities that
have long cast a shadow over such utopian relics and lyricism!
We could point to two further examples regarding the contradictions
attributed to Okwui Enwezor: Isaac Julien directs the "Das Kapital"
project, a live reading of the book throughout the biennial's duration, and
is also the producer of a video of interviews with Marxists theorists David
Harvey and Stuart Hall. On the other hand, Julien's new film is financed by
Rolls-Royce; and as the reading of Das Kapital continued, a flamboyant
party was organized for Julien, with only the rich invited. Julien himself
admits that he had received, and in a sense, was cornered by questions
regarding this contradiction.
May 9 was the day the Biennale was opened to the public after the VIPs had
swiftly left Venice; and the Giardini, which the day before had long queues
in front of the pavilions and cafes was almost empty!
In this context, it is also necessary to mention the journalists, either
sent to Venice by the press and media outlets they work for, and especially
to the openings of pavilions, or working freelance. A part of these
journalists are politics or economy reporters, while the rest are culture
and arts reporters. No doubt, aware of the complexity of the political-
economic-cultural impact of the visual arts today, these journalists do not
write these articles before making sure they have gathered comprehensive
information. Their source of information is, first and foremost, the press
releases prepared by curators, edited with the intervention of PR companies
hired either by pavilions or their sponsors. Exclusive interviews with
artists and curators are methods of gathering more detailed information.
There is no need for me to point out the relativity of this entire process.
These journalist-writers who can access the true meanings of the works that
are on display, and the real processes involved in these pavilions which
are subject to all manners of intervention in the context of the Neo-
Capitalist order, can consider themselves lucky. Therefore, with the
exception of those who do not get sucked in by this process of the society
of the spectacle, journalists' articles on the Venice Biennale are best
read as "tabloid" articles. I observed significant lacks in information,
and comments of arguable validity in all the biennial articles I could
read.

The Armenia and Turkey Pavilions in the Darkness of the 1915-2015 Armenian
Genocide
From 1991 to 2005, I acted 6 times as the curator of the Venice Biennale
Turkey Pavilion. (7) Since 2007, the Pavilion of Turkey, under the
management of İKSV (the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts), has
presented the works of Hüseyin Alptekin, Ayşe Erkmen and Ali Kazma,
respectively. This year is the 100th Anniversary of the 1915 Armenian
Genocide, and at this critical time for the Pavilion of Turkey, Sarkis was
invited to represent Turkey in the name of cultural correctness. No doubt,
other artists of Armenian origin from Turkey could have been invited; for
instance, Ani Setyan, Ani Arev Çelikyan, Hera Büyüktaşçıyan, or Kirkor
Sahakoğlu. Or, Sarkis could have displayed generosity and worked not only
with these artists, but also with some artists from Armenia, and could have
entered into a dialogue with them to create a unique collaborative
exhibition.
Sarkis preferred to present a series of works, which were an extension of
the exhibition he held last year at Galeri Mana in Istanbul, and what we
could also describe as a retrospective of the most recent period of his
career. As is known, for around twenty years, Sarkis has produced
installations for almost all the important museums in EU cities, and is an
artist renowned especially in European art circles. In this exhibition,
too, he fulfils his responsibility with a high-quality installation as
would be expected of him. My view of his installation are as follows: The
installation is composed of parts that are either individual metaphors he
has developed throughout his career, or metaphors of the cultural,
linguistic and religious memory of the land he belongs to. Sarkis displays
the qualities of his generation – which is the generation which from 1970
to 1990 created movements such as New Realism, Arte Povera and Fluxus in
Europe – establishing relationships between life and art, quoting from pre-
Modernism local and universal cultures and especially aiming to lift the
distance between memory and contemporaneity. Sarkis chooses not to act
polemically and does not directly refer to the Armenian Genocide; he
elevates his view to a conceptual and spiritual plane, and presents
therapeutic proposals for the solution of this century-old trauma. This is
a wise and prudent act by a senior artist.
The problem here is not that the İKSV, the curator and the artist are doing
this in a pavilion involving "State" representation and with private sector
sponsorship. It is a known fact that these biennials are major fields of
respectability for states and sponsors. The problem is that "states" and
"sponsors", in the context of today's political-economic-social variables,
wish to use art as a vehicle for their own policies. The state in Turkey
and the present government do not recognize the Armenian Genocide, and they
are also against it being recognized by other states, or peoples and
institutions. The relationships between the private sector and the
state/government do not allow the private sector to openly recognize the
Genocide either. The truth of the matter is that, in both pavilions
(Armenia and Turkey), which are realized via State "national"
representation, we see that the producers and curators have acted with
caution on this officially problematic issue, because in both countries the
nation-state ideology prevails, their democracies are damaged, and racist
mentalities are common.
Turkey almost appeared as if it had overcome this troublesome matter thanks
to Sarkis's wisdom; however, the censoring of the word 'Genocide' in the
catalogue presented a drastic example of the threat freedom of expression
faces in Turkey. The censorship last month targeting a documentary part of
the screening programme at the Istanbul Film Festival, an event also
organized by İKSV, was also adequately drastic; therefore, İKSV must review
its relationship with the "State" and if necessary, not work at all with
the State during this period. We can't imagine what would have happened if
Sarkis had laid his wisdom to one side and produced a work that directly
pointed to the Genocide!
Today, in countries with compromised democracies, everyone working in the
art and culture industry faces the political and economic variables beyond
the unique value and function of this phenomenon and production, and
constantly develops new strategies. In this struggle, both victory and
defeat may await artists and art experts!
There are, in fact, five artists from Turkey at the Biennale: Kutluğ
Ataman, Meriç Algün Ringborg, Bedri Baykam, Denizhan Özer, Erdağ Aksel and
Ahmet Güneştekin. I have already pointed out to the fact that there are
many works at the Biennial that focus on regional crises, wars, massacres,
exploitation of labour and ecological disasters; however, there is no
metaphor or comment in the works of these artists that touches upon the
political and cultural cul-de-sacs and problems Turkey faces, or the
continuing refugee crisis/disaster! Here, the global audience saw a bright
and sunny view of Turkey.
The work Kutluğ Ataman produced for Sakıp Sabancı was the topic of the
Continental Breakfast forum held on 8 May at the Museo Ca'Rezzonico. (8)
Why is a work celebrating the life of a businessman included in Enwezor's
exhibition? The businessman in question was a collector of art ad a museum
founder; however, he also asked for the opening exhibition of the Aksanat
Gallery, which belonged to a bank he owned, to feature the nonsensical
paintings of General Kenan Evren, the junta leader of the September 12,
1980 coup d'état – who by great coincidence once again made the news by
dying during the opening days of the biennale. Artists had protested
against that exhibition. Ataman couldn't possibly have foreseen that he
would be invited to the Venice Biennale with this work when he was
producing it upon a commission from the Sabancı Museum, and which could be
described more as a work of technological media art, the kind that is more
often presented in technology fairs, and used in the world of advertising.
The question that needs asking here is: Did he think, when he was invited,
that this depthless work, which was in fact produced to commemorate a
businessman, would not fit in at this biennial where Okwui Enwezor embarks
upon a critique of capitalism? And if he did, why didn't he propose a more
suitable work; for instance, his Küba (9) project would have fitted in very
well at this biennial! On the other hand, one could also consider a
different line of thought: the production of an artwork for a business man
is a realistic manifestation of the Neo-Capitalist order's dominance over
art! Ringborg's interior installation, associated with the seamanship in
her family past and the yearning for "objects of memory" of people trapped
on land, conveyed a message of hope for a Turkey consistent with qualities
such as calmness, nostalgia, and relative happiness. It appears that the
artist, who resides in the EU, relates to her home country on this
optimistic plane.
The Armenia Pavilion, which received the Golden Lion in line with the
realistic and fair approach displayed by many EU-member countries regarding
the century-old issue of the "Armenian Genocide" is at the San Lazarro
Island, which is allocated at almost every biennial to the use of artists
both from Armenia and other countries. One of the most magnificent works
produced here was Joseph Kosuth's 2007-installation using words written in
neon tubing, titled "The Language of Equilibrium", which was realized again
under the curatorship of Adelina von Fürstenberg.
The island of San Lazzaro is home to the headquarters of the Mechitarist
Order, founded in Istanbul by a theologian named Mkhitar Sebastatsi in the
early 18th century. Escaping persecution by the Ottoman authorities,
Mkhitar arrived here in 1715 with his monks and founded the monastery in
1717. The monastery has over 140,000 volumes of books, 4,500 valuable
manuscripts and until 1993, was home to a printing house that could print
books in 36 languages. It was at this printing house that the Bible was
translated and published in Armenian. Hera Büyüktaşçıyan presents a work
that refers to the monastery in its role as a printing house.
Adelina von Fürstenberg, no doubt, built this exhibition around the 1915
Armenian Genocide, she invited artists from the Armenian Diaspora, and
placed the exhibition, with great mastery, within this monastery. The
content and aesthetic quality of the exhibition awarded with the Golden
Lion was high, yet this was also a strategic award Armenia deserved in the
context of the 1915 Genocide. This award was naturally met with great joy
in the art circles of Armenia; however, the same circles also voiced their
expectation for this award to bring a solution to the economic shortcomings
and difficulties experienced there in the fields of art and culture.

I am glad to have previously supported and exhibited three artists in this
exhibition. In 2010, we realized Silvina der Meguerditchian's exhibition
titled "Well Done My Little Child! Little Gestures of Cooperation" at the
BM Contemporary Art Centre space in Karaköy. The exhibition by Silvina der
Meguerditchian, an artist of Armenian-origin, born in Buenos Aires and
living in Berlin, featured photographs, documents, videos, installations
and objects reflecting her 20-year experience of trying to deal with a
memory, a forgiving and a compromise. Hera Büyüktaşçıyan was invited to the
workshop of Remo Salvadori, the first guest artist of the 'Lives and Works
in Istanbul' project carried out within the scope of Istanbul 2010,
European Capital of Culture (16 December 2008 – 6 January 2009) and she
then exhibited the carpet installation she produced at this workshop at the
historical space the Nakilbent Cistern, built in the 6th century during the
reign of Emperor Justinian of Nakkaş Oriental Rugs&Textiles in Sultanahmet.
Nigol Bezjiyan was invited to the 4th Çanakkale Biennial and presented a
video featuring the conversations with locals of a soldier who wandered the
streets in a uniform worn by soldiers in 1915 during the War of Gallipoli
and introduced himself as 'Sarkis'; and a work featuring portraits of more
than 40 Armenian soldiers who served during the Ottoman period and after.
My aim in evoking these instances is to make it clear that artists of
Armenian origin have, for at least the last decade, with a series of
significant works, raised awareness, even if it was not in a direct manner,
regarding the Armenian Genocide in the Istanbul art environment.
While the immortal words of Karl Marx were being read out at the Arena,
careful viewers of the exhibition titled "Codice Italia" at the final
section of the Arsenale, could have thought that Umberto Eco's words in the
three-part video interview titled Sulla Memoria (On Memory) directed by
Davide Ferrario also contained an immortal message. Eco's words in this
video alone are testament to the immense reservoir of oral-visual knowledge
this biennial has produced. Addressing future generations, Eco speaks about
Italy's past and present, making a valuable contribution to this
exhibition, which pays homage to the history of Italy. From the video, I
selected the following words, which are also significantly valid for
Turkey: "Memory is soul… If somebody loses his memory he becomes like a
plant … Even for a believer, hell has no meaning without memory." (10)
Although the Venice Biennale does not get a high mark due to the dilemmas
it presents and the criticism it has faced, it continues to be the greatest
event of global memory through art works.
Beral Madra, June 2015


Translated from Turkish by Nazım Hikmet Dikbaş

(1) https://twitter.com/pluversum/media
(2) http://biennalist.blogspot.com.tr
(3) http://www.marxist.com/marx-was-right.htm
(4) https://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/essays/culturalmarxism.pdf
(5) https://pages.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/essays/culturalmarxism.pdf
(6) Untitled, 2015 (14,086, unfired), 2015. Bricks, wooden stamps, tools,
people, dimensions variable.
(7) Information regarding the Pavilion of Turkey until 2005 can be accessed
at www.beralmadra.net
(8) http://www.triestecontemporanea.it/news.php?id_news=235&l=e&id_m=2
(9) http://www.artangel.org.uk/projects/2005/kuba
(10) (http://www.codiceitalia2015.com/en/exhibition/on-memory).