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[title]ISTANBUL IS FAST PROVING itself an alpha city in the worlds of arts and culture. Apart from the emergence of numerous new and highly anticipated galleries, arts platforms and museums, the consistency of recurring events play an important role in this – and many would argue none more so than Contemporary Istanbul. In its 14th year, Contemporary Istanbul hosts an impressive array of participants from around the globe, with more than 80 galleries representing a total of 650 artists and upwards of 2000 artworks. As always, the fair is set to attract industry insiders, collectors, art lovers, and socialites alike.
Anissa Touati - Contemporary Istanbul Artistic Director
ANISSA TOUATI SERVES as the Associate Director of Chalet Society, a project designed to encourage new reflection on the contemporary art institution, and is known for her work in introducing Mexican art to the rest of the world. Having worked as curator for many international exhibitions, Touati looks poised to galvanize Contemporary Istanbul.
Can you tell us about yourself?
I’m a French curator and have spent my last five years in Mexico developing projects, exhibitions, videos in and outside of the country, operating mostly in South America, the US, Western Europe, and Lebanon. Seeking to make connections between these territories, I invested myself culturally by traveling widely, visiting studios, and by individually committing myself to each artist’s story. Each of my exhibitions is tied to an own experience, usually reflecting the exploration of a geography.
How did you feel when you were appointed as artistic director? How did your past experience come into play?
I found it very challenging and saw it as a possibility to explore the intersection between art markets, institutions, a new generation of galleries and a second generation of curators. I have participated in many projects worldwide, from Art Basel in Miami and Switzerland to Zona Maco in Mexico, and curated exhibitions for renowned galleries like Galerie Perrotin in Paris, Galería OMR in Mexico, and Galería Barro in Buenos Aires among others. Working on big projects like this helped me to attain an international scope of the art world.
Where do you place Istanbul in general and Contemporary Istanbul in particular within the global art scene?
I think that today there is a revival of interest from the international art crowd regarding Istanbul. In 2019 and 2020, nine new art centres and museums will be opening, including Vehbi Koç Foundation’s Arter, and the Atatürk Cultural Centre. The art world is co-dependent and Contemporary Istanbul connects collectors, galleries, artists, institutions, independent curators, art critics, and journalists. Thus, it’s a driving force in supporting the role galleries play in nurturing the careers of artists but also acts as a relay between institutions and exhibition makers.
What sets Contemporary Istanbul apart from other art fairs?
Given its its geographical location, Contemporary Istanbul collaborates with galleries from niche regions and focuses on bringing different assets together. Through its participating galleries and artistic programme, the ambition of CI’19 is to show the dynamism of Turkey as a geographical hub that is closely tied to Russia, Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia. This in itself is far more characteristic of Turkey today than tired notions of it being a gateway to the “East” and “Orient”.
What new things can we expect to see?
This year, collectors and visitors are going to explore a new fair featuring 22 new international galleries, 3 new Turkish galleries, and 7 international art initiatives. We have commissioned a mural by Turkish artist Gülay Semercioğlu, a sculpture by French artist Ugo Schiavi, and an “intervention” by Swiss artist Renée Levi, among others. A sculpture park featuring Turkish and international artists is going to end the fair walk through the Lütfi Kırdar Convention Centre.
What inspired your decision to include an open air space at this year’s fair?
I wanted to go beyond the concrete architecture of the convention centre and bring in nature. Visiting a fair is always very intense and I wanted visitors to be able to walk into a fictional garden overlooking the Bosphorus at the end of their visit.
Esra Özkan – Curator of Plugin ESRA ÖZKAN HAS BEEN ACTIVE in different departments of galleries and museums since 2011. She is the director and curator of bang. Art Innovation Prix set up by ArtBizTech, and bases her unique blend of technology, science, and art on philosophy.
Please tell us a little bit about Plugin.
Plugin is a new section within Contemporary Istanbul that is dedicated to rejuvenating and evolving contemporary art through digital and new media. It will create great add-ons to this international fair’s regular output by bringing together topical examples of today’s new aesthetic language.
How did your interest in philosophy shape your curatorial approach?
As a curator who has dedicated her curatorial efforts on bridging philosophy with digital arts, I try to envisage new media through what Kant defined as ‘Phenomena’, namely through the view of appearances. The way I see it, if our experience can intuitively reach the aesthetic philosophy behind the art, then the work will leave an indelible mark in our consciousness beyond our retinal perception. Here, art comes together with technology, which is one of the main components in our pursuit to understand and feel the universe.
How did you go about choosing this year’s artists? What are the focuses of the selected artists work and trends that influenced them?
I divided the space into sections dedicated to new media, bio-art, design, and performance, and got together with enthusiastic artists who thought and created work along those lines. I can say that current trends in new media revolve mostly around the interplay of human, computer, and machine. As for bio-art, what we see is mostly experimental works, while our design section is centred on how technology is used for product development and how it is combined with art.
How does new media and technology inform the ways in which art is presented? Can you give us some examples from this year’s offerings to explain this?
Auditory performances, artificial intelligence, sonic art, machine and human interactive art, AR and VR are amongst the ways in which viewers will experience art at CI this year. One of the unique projects I can mention is an installation titled ‘Arkhe’. The creative teams behind DECOL and Nohlab collaborated on this project, which creates an analogy between house appliances and elements like fire and water that symbolize them.