With Exploded City, Ahmet Öğüt envisions an imaginary metropolis comprising buildings, monuments, and vehicles that have figured in acts of violence and terrorism over the past two decades.
Ahmet Öğüt’s piece "Exploded City"—on view at the Berkeley Art Museum until April 11, 2010—is composed entirely of models of buildings that have been damaged or destroyed by terrorist strikes since the 1990s. The structures may be in their inviolate form, but nevertheless, human models placed throughout the doomed buildings would impart a macabre note to the city. Rhizome
It was a summer day when Marco Polo appeared before Kubilay
Khan. The emperor, certain that the Venetian would be describing
some unheard of city that morning, said: So, tell me.
Marco Polo, in his voice still bearing the impressions of the city
from his most recent travel, begins his narration:
This city is from the future. It’s called The Exploded City. Those
who live there have emigrated from faraway lands, with dreams of
traveling to the future. When they realized that there was no finding
the future, they decided to build this city. It is said that hundreds of
different languages, such as Otesian, Bosnian, Albanian, Kurdish,
Castilian, Irish, Turkish, Persian, Arabic, Urdu, Anglo-Frisian, and
other Saami, Altaic, and Slavic languages are spoken in this city. These
people who don’t speak each other’s language, instead of creating a
lingua franca, have learned to communicate through looking into one
another’s eyes. Not before long, they taught me this eye language as
well. In this city, all the other remaining languages are like a constant
background noise. They actually resemble the besieging of the city by
various types of birds.
Excerpt from Exploded City - pdf
3 Comments
Orhan, so the building's are shown un-damaged?
Also, i thought this graph from the Rhizome link interesting?
he World Trade Center is notably absent. Had it been included, the parameters of the debate that Exploded City provokes would have shifted, the mythic made present. Although several audience members at the artist talk aimed to buttonhole Öğüt on the subject of Israel, in his work he largely avoided the most controversial terrorist destruction, and was geographically and ideologically indiscriminate in his selection of buildings.
What do you think?
not concentrating on israel? very smart move.. although he included the destruction of the restaurant in hayfa, which as i remember owned by arab israelis, i think he saved the expected polemics and the usual discussions had he given into arab israeli conflict. it keeps the work inside the mythical territory which works great in art context.
just saying..
i would have more to say had i seen the show.
Omission.... a rhetorical device. And a choice. By not revealing the obvious the observer, the spectator, the audience, fills in the blanks. And that contemplation is the epiphany one feels and the irony one gets.
eric
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