Turkish artist Ahmet Güneştekin’s first Italian solo exhibition, “Monumentum of Memory”, on show at Arsenale Doks Castello 40 in Venice, presents three videos and a great art installation that engages the attention of the visitors to the political oppression and persecution of the Kurdish community. Instead of employing rhetoric of horror, Güneştekin, born 1966 presents events worth remembering in an impeccable artistic language, dealing also with the paradox of aesthetic.
A floor projection shows the dates of Kurdish, Turkish deeds and Human Rights from 1909 to present; a double projection points out how Kurdish language has been banned and carefully removed from Turkish vocabulary while the last video shows people getting fined for speaking Kurdish. The sculpture “Regm” (stoning) consists of Kurdish letters confined behind ancient prison bars. The big wall installation at the end of the exhibition itinerary is a mirror/ sculpture that at first glance appears to be abstract composition. But a closer look reveals images and symbols about the Kurdish genocide by the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein in 1988 in the town of Halepce. The installation is called “Yüzleşme” that means comfort.
A monument to the Kurdish memory, as seen through the eyes of a contemporary artist.
Ideas and concepts that confirm the presence of a genius loci from the Mesopotamian culture.
