Çizgelikedi Kadınlar Projesi-2: 08/20/09

Cizgelikedi Women’s Project-II

Identity and Obedience

Doesn’t “the one in power” who pushes the button, who pulls the trigger, who signs the papers, who breaks the pen after deciding death penalty also obey to a higher authority, laws, morals, or patriarchs? Just think about it for a second: who/what do we obey each and every moment when we assume that our existence is taken for granted and we independently make our own decisions? Who do we expect obedience from just when we glorify freedom? Why do we appreciate well-mannered kids and treat disobedient ones as naughty youngsters?

In Cizgelikedi Women’s Project this year, a project group consisted of women from different ages and professions questioned the nature of “us” shaped by the mass media, neighbourhoods, school managements, police forces, mothers/fathers/husbands/lovers, ready made furniture, fashion industry, advertisements, and the establishment itself. They produced images out of the questions and the answers they found and shared them in an exhibition.

“Identity and Obedience” photography exhibition presents photographs produced during the project by Yeser Sariyildiz, Ulker Sokulluoglu, Sehlem Sebik, Nurhan Dogan, Meltem Ciftci, Latife Ozyurt, Isik Deniz Nalbantoglu, Isik Gulcubuk, Gonul Ocak, Fenay Ulu, Emel Kayin, Canan Gumusalan, Ayse Aytun Aytar, Aysun Okuzcuoglu Tasar, Aynur Sen, Asli Oktener Kose and Arzu F. Gungor

About Cizgelikedi and Women’s Project

Cizgelikedi was founded in 2005 in Izmir, a portal city situated in the West end of Anatolian peninsula. This little center of visual culture set off with a view to create a momentum and interaction putting a premium on quality in the art of photography in a city which has been deprived of cultural and economic motivation despite its 8000 years of history, a population of 3.5 million people and its natural beauty.

Cizgelikedi has become a center of visual arts where seminars on photography training and workshops are being held, public discussions and talks on visual culture are being organized, and production of works of a certain quality is being supported through projects. The first project group of the Cizgelikedi initiative was Cizgelikedi Women’s Project in 2006-2007 which involved 19 women photographers in a project, “Identity and Power”. The initiative continued its projects with a different group in 2007-2009 with a project called “Identity and Obedience” which presented photographs of 17 women photographers in an exhibition. The primary purpose of both projects was to experience a common ground of production with women photographers of Izmir who were keen to use photography as a tool for artistic expression, focusing upon a social concept and share these productions with the people in an exhibition.

The project consisted of three basic steps, which, in turn, made up a workshop project as a whole as described in detail in the call for participation. The first step was to determine the concept for discussion and production processes. This step was initiated in November 2007 under the moderation of Cizgelikedi and the participants were asked to suggest phrases beginning with “identity and ……” and discuss the concept in an interactive manner. The discussions were enriched with the participation of academicians and experts, and the suggestions were put together and discussed in the group. The books and articles that were considered to be helpful were read and discussed collectively. Consequently, the long list of suggestions was screened and “identity and obedience” concept was singled out altogether due to its abundant cross references as well as its enriching and complementary interrelation with the previous project, “Identity and Power”.

The second step of the project was to discuss the concept from a variety of perspectives and conduct researches to trigger different associations.

The last step of the project, which lasted between 2008 fall and 2009 spring, included discussions about the photographs produced during the project. The discussions were focused on conceptual relevance, visual representation, originality, technical proficiency, context and form for each photograph.

This long term process constituted the base of the common ground for the photographers who sincerely did their best to understand and discuss the merits of the works of other photographers and wholeheartedly accepted the critiques and suggestions (and even sometimes active support in terms of equipment, space and modeling) about their own photographs. The images that were just conceptual sketches at first were developed, matured and sometimes transformed into new images with new ideas and the final decision whether or not the image would be included in the exhibition was made with joint resolution.

The exhibition took place in Cizgelikedi Center of Visual Culture between May 19-June 19 2009. As the project has been designed as an exhibition on wheels, the calendar of upcoming events is to be scheduled with a priority for Izmir and neighbouring towns, starting with Urla, Karaburun and Foca.

http://www.cizgelikedi.com

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