Fahrelnissa Zeid @ Istanbul Modern

Fahrelnissa Zeid
Istanbul Modern
May 30 - July 30, 2017

Istanbul Modern presents a selection from its comprehensive collection of works by Fahrelnissa Zeid, a pioneer of modern art in Turkey and one of the first exponents of abstract art.

 Eleven years after “Two Generations of the Rainbow”, Istanbul Modern’s retrospective of  Fahrelnissa Zeid together with her son Nejad Melih Devrim, Istanbul Modern revisits  its collection of Fahrelnissa Zeid for a special selection in its Pop-Up Exhibition Area.

The exhibition features 23 artworks, not only abstract geometric compositions in which the artist excelled, but also expressionist paintings that merge her unique color palette with references to Byzantine, Islamic, and Western art.

The selection focuses on Fahrelnissa Zeid’s most prolific years between the 1940s, that marks her introduction to the art scene in Turkey, and the 1970s, when she moved to Amman, Jordan.

The global art world’s revived interest in Fahrelnissa Zeid has led to a flurry of her works in 2017, including group shows in Haus der Kunst in Munich and GAM di Torino. This year, 8 works from the Istanbul Museum of Modern Art Collection that are among the most important in Zeid’s career will be on view in London, Berlin, and Beirut, starting with her retrospective at Tate Modern as of June the 13th.

Oya Eczacıbaşı: Our first donation, which made a dream come true

Oya Eczacıbaşı, Chair of the Board of Istanbul Modern, explained the special significance of Fahrelnissa Zeid to Istanbul Modern as well as in Turkey’s modern art: “When Istanbul Modern was still just an idea, the family of Turkey’s world-renowned artist Fahrelnissa Zeid made a gift of her masterpiece ‘My Hell’ to the museum we dreamed of opening one day. The moment Istanbul Modern was founded, the first work to enter the museum was this one. With Zeid’s increased visibility in the global art world, we wanted to bring the artist’s works together again after 11 years and introduce them to new generations.”

Levent Çalıkoğlu: “Zeid’s position in the global art world is secured”

Noting that 2017 is the year of Zeid in the global art world, Istanbul Modern Director Levent Çalıkoğlu added: “Without a doubt Fahrelnissa Zeid’s life story, character and approach to art make her one of the most creative artists of her generation and epoch. The belated interest of Western museums and art community in Zeid’s person and works, which is clearly evident in this year’s international exhibition calendar, is restoring her the value she deserves. In particular, the retrospective that Tate Modern is organizing will secure Zeid’s position in the global art world. Since we have a comprehensive collection of Zeid’s work, we are also supporting this global interest with this selection.”

FAHRELNISSA ZEID (1901-1991)

Fahrelnissa Zeid was born on Büyükada in 1901 during the Ottoman era as the niece of Grand Vizier Cevat Paşa. She came from a large family of artists that included author Cevat Şakir Kabaağaçlı and painter Aliye Berger, her siblings. Her children from her marriage with author İzzet Melih Devrim were the painter Nejad Melih Devrim and the director and theater actress Şirin Devrim. Zeid was also the aunt of ceramic artist Füreya Koral.

One of the first female graduates of the Sanayi-i Nefise (Academy of Fine Arts), Fahrelnissa Zeid continued her studies in painting in the studio of Stalbach at the Académie Ranson in Paris, and later in the studio of Namık İsmail in Istanbul. In 1934, she married Prince Zeid, the ambassador of Iraq in Ankara, and became a princess. In 1942, she joined the Group D and took part in their exhibitions.

After her first solo exhibition held in her home in Maçka in 1944, Fahrelnissa Zeid had her works exhibited in Paris, London, New York, Brussels, and other cities where the couple lived after World War II. In 1976, Fahrelnissa Zeid moved permanently to Amman, where she established an institute of arts bearing her name and which she supported throughout her remaining years while continuing to produce art. She died in 1991 in Amman.

Known for her exuberant, powerful compositions, Fahrelnissa Zeid has a unique visual language so vivid and rich that it cannot be reduced to a single style. Her artistic practice can be classified under the following periods: an early period of figurative compositions with spaces constructed according to the style of miniatures; a period of maturity with geometrical and freely abstractionist works reminiscent of stained glass surfaces; and a late period consisting mainly of portraits in which psychological narrative comes to the fore.

ISTANBUL MODERN
www.instanbulmodern.org

Video Art Exhibition – Istanbul Modern

Nothing Lasts Forever

Video Art Exhibition

ISTANBUL MODERN

Feburary 1 - May 12, 2006

Nothing Lasts Forever, the 3rd Video Programme at Istanbul Modern presents a selectiorı of significant works by Hussein Chalayan (Turkey), Fischli & Weiss (Switzerland) and Sam Taylor-Wood (Great Britain). These art works are relevant examples of how photography, cinema and video are inexcusable seed-beds for shaping our contemporary iconosphere. Such media have forged their artistic identity reworking representational techniques derived from previous creative traditions. Pictorial composition, theatrical stage sets and the fabling function of the novel are thus updated and transformed to shape our new visual and narrative models. Placing the accent on time and duration, the selected video works heighten out awareness of the fleetingness of time and the lack of eternal truths. They also evince the disappearance of boundaries between artistic disciplines such as painting, sculpture and fashion, and prove how art is able to embody the interactions between different fields of knowledge. 

HUSSEIN CHALAYAN

Hussein Chalayan (Cyprus, b. 1970) links fashion and performance to explore the politics of beauty in relation to the conflicts of his time. 

"Aeroplane Dress" (1999) is a video in which a fashion model directs her gaze at the spectator while different elements of her white metallic dress open up as if she is about to depart creating a powerful image of travelling bodies. "Afterwords" (2000) refers to the painful situation of having to flee your home at a time of war and having to conceal your most treasured possessions; as the artist says, "I wanted to somehow turn a horrific situation into something more poetic." 

FISCHLI & WEISS

The Swiss duo, Peter Fischli (Zurich, b. 1952) and David Weiss, (Zurich, b. 1945), has been working together since 1979 in the field s of sculpture, installation, film and photography. Their work, which is humorous, emotional and deeply metaphysical, explores the relationships between order and chaos, the everyday and the sublime, arousing a feeling of fascination in the spectator, who is invited to discover "the small miracles in everyday life". 

"The Way Things Go" (1987) is a film on a 100-foot long kinetic structure with everyday objects such as old tires, bottles, ladders and even soapsuds that were joined together. When the sculpture was set in motion, a controlled and surprising chain of reactions started creating an amusing happening, The work plays with the laws of physics and chemistry, deals with inevitability and chance and discovers the cosmic magic of a universe in precarious circumstances. 

"Büsy (Kitty)" (2001) presents a cat drinking milk in a dish. The work is a proposal for us to slow down and see how nice it is to just contemplate everyday life. There is a moment of marvel and peace in the fact that nothing or almost nothing is happening and no one is explaining anything. 

SAM TAYLOR-WOOD

Born in London in 1967 and trained as a sculptor at Goldsmiths College, Sam Taylor-Wood asserts that photo and video were a natural development in her research. Her work relates to human vulnerability and contemporary ennui. Many of her pieces are like tableaux vivants where the camel a has a fixed viewpoint and things take place within a unique frame. 

'Still Life" (2001) presents a classic and iconic arrangement of fruit that recalls a painting by Caravaggio or Zurbaran. The pieces of fruit, filmed in time-lapse at very high speed. blossom with mould before putrefying completely and turning into dust in front of viewers' very eyes. This accelerated process reveals the beauty of decay and its surprising and astonishing vitality. 

A Little Death" (2002) is a living composition arranged to appear as a seventeenth-century painting. The body of a dead hare hangs from its leg nailed to the wall, its head resting on a table beside a rosy peach. As the body of the hare begins to rat the animal seems to come alive again thanks to the unremitting movement of the maggots suggesting that life steams out of death. This piece was shot over nine weeks and one of its most intriguing aspects -the resolutely unaffected peach- was in fact an unforeseen accident: an out-of-season fruit that remained whole amidst its surrounding putrefaction.

This video art exhibition was curated by Rosa Martínez

With the Contribution of Caylon - Credit Agricole Group