merve üstünalp
merve üstünalp
'Once We Were, Once We Weren't'
5-28 September 2013.
"Once We Were, Once We Weren’t" doesn’t take the knots made with needles and thread as the end point of a frame, to the contrary it wants to hear the common voice of many different stories tied to each other with invisible strings. These stories mirror the utmost hypocrisy of morality, the looks mixed with shame, and the tragicomedy of social lifestyle impositions coming from the impressions Merve Üstünalp carries from her personal past and of her present. The materials the artist chooses to use, cloth, rope, oil paint, canvas, acetate paper take on the job of acting as witnesses in embodying her experiences. One can feel a strong sense of wit towards the male-dominated view and society’s entrenched perceptions in the works where the figures stare unflinchingly right into our eyes. Who is in control this time? Since we see these stories through the eyes of a young woman, the relationship between the observed and the observer becomes topsy-turvy. Cloth and string, being strongly associated with women’s every day lives are by default criticisms in themselves and the reason why the artist uses them heavily as means of interpretation.
In her work “A Wedding Memoir” Üstünalp invites viewers to scan their memory through a wedding scene; a scene where fancy yet foggy faces send a message to a shared past. A composition where the heroes are “here today, gone tomorrow” we see a familiar scene with from popular culture and tv, whose names have been erased from our minds, who are in search of the adventures of their 2nd and 3rd springs within programs with titles such as “Don’t stand in the way of my marital bliss”. On the other hand, she searches for answers to questions such as “How does society shape bodies?” while drawing attention to being a woman in a patriarchal society where defining femininity within a prevalent discourse turns into an effort to domesticate women. In her piece called “The Unwaxed” with the impulse to see a metamorphosis from the ugly to the beautiful as an obligation, those whose bodies have reached the established norms of beauty refuse this domestication with every unwanted hair they have ever been warned against. While questioning the pasts of those whose freedoms are being withheld in the now, “Once We Were, Once We Weren’t” has an approach beyond the good, proper, beautiful while emphasizing these bodies, which are expected to behave themselves.
Merve Üstünalp was born in Çanakkale in 1987. She graduated from Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Department of Painting in 2012. She lives and works in Istanbul.
'Once We Were, Once We Weren't'
5-28 September 2013.
"Once We Were, Once We Weren’t" doesn’t take the knots made with needles and thread as the end point of a frame, to the contrary it wants to hear the common voice of many different stories tied to each other with invisible strings. These stories mirror the utmost hypocrisy of morality, the looks mixed with shame, and the tragicomedy of social lifestyle impositions coming from the impressions Merve Üstünalp carries from her personal past and of her present. The materials the artist chooses to use, cloth, rope, oil paint, canvas, acetate paper take on the job of acting as witnesses in embodying her experiences. One can feel a strong sense of wit towards the male-dominated view and society’s entrenched perceptions in the works where the figures stare unflinchingly right into our eyes. Who is in control this time? Since we see these stories through the eyes of a young woman, the relationship between the observed and the observer becomes topsy-turvy. Cloth and string, being strongly associated with women’s every day lives are by default criticisms in themselves and the reason why the artist uses them heavily as means of interpretation.
In her work “A Wedding Memoir” Üstünalp invites viewers to scan their memory through a wedding scene; a scene where fancy yet foggy faces send a message to a shared past. A composition where the heroes are “here today, gone tomorrow” we see a familiar scene with from popular culture and tv, whose names have been erased from our minds, who are in search of the adventures of their 2nd and 3rd springs within programs with titles such as “Don’t stand in the way of my marital bliss”. On the other hand, she searches for answers to questions such as “How does society shape bodies?” while drawing attention to being a woman in a patriarchal society where defining femininity within a prevalent discourse turns into an effort to domesticate women. In her piece called “The Unwaxed” with the impulse to see a metamorphosis from the ugly to the beautiful as an obligation, those whose bodies have reached the established norms of beauty refuse this domestication with every unwanted hair they have ever been warned against. While questioning the pasts of those whose freedoms are being withheld in the now, “Once We Were, Once We Weren’t” has an approach beyond the good, proper, beautiful while emphasizing these bodies, which are expected to behave themselves.
Merve Üstünalp was born in Çanakkale in 1987. She graduated from Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Department of Painting in 2012. She lives and works in Istanbul.