Infidel Quarter
Güneştekin Foundation Publishing, November 2022
153 pages
Turkish, English
Design: Şener Özmen
The catalogue accompanying Infidel Quarter opens with an essay by Müslüm Yücel that provides the artist’s sensitive approach to the individual quality of each stone. The book includes Şener Özmen’s article, in which he discusses the etymologies of curatorial concepts as well as their historical and social contexts. Özmen investigates the exhibition’s metaphorical layers, which serve as the foundation for the issues of forced migration and exchange. The publication also features an article by Yıldıray Oğur in which he argues that in the newly-out-of-war Republic, ethnic diversity was perceived as both the cause of the empire’s fall and a security problem that had to be solved, and the policies implemented to purify this negative multi-cultural experience. The book closes with essays expressing that the memory of the Greek-Turkish exchange was a powerful influence on policymakers in the historical world and that the remnants of the past continue to play a vital role in contemporary society that goes beyond the exchange context. The book includes installation views, video stills, and reproduction photographs of the works.