SIFIR-CHYPER,1991

SIFIR-CHYPER, 1991, soldered tin cans, 209 x 209 x 16 cm

This work serves as manifesto of a new beginning. When I settled in Ankara, in 1990 I had this idea about changing how art made in Turkey. I wanted to introduce a new language, a language that used local and regional vocabulary, dealing with local issues and not a western prescription dealing with western issues. In this way this was the zero point of that era thus the “sıfır” in the title which means zero. It was the ground zero of this undoing the westernization project. Sıfır also has a semiotic relationship to sefer a journey which relates to chyper or cipher

which in cryptography, is an algorithm for performing encryption or decryption—a series of well-defined steps that can be followed as a procedure.

For my ground zero, I decided to first establish an alphabet. My family comes form a    contingency that practiced Bektashism, a Sufi dervish order practiced a form of Kabala in secrecy called “writing pictures” I found the Anatolian Kabala tradition very interesting; they painted images of human and other living beings which were banned under islamic rules, out of calligraphic letters. They were done in secrecy and displayed in secrecy, usually covered with a cloth on the wall. I wanted to invert this art form and make “picture writings” using skills I learned apprenticing for a sign maker at a young age. I started making text out of images instead of vice verso. During this process I wanted to talk about recycling, making something else from discarded and never waste anything which was a phenomena exist exclusively in poor countries. West was busy investing in increasing consumption as a way of growing a stimulated economy. There were no fashionable terms or concepts as recycle or reduce but it was an integral part of underdeveloped countries. With this work, I started making a body of work, show other artists a new (but old) method and talk about this phenomena.

I wanted use a vocabulary that was local and global at the same time, for that reason I made my alphabet 32 letters, combination of Turkish, Kurdish and English letters. With this work, it was also important to talk about craftsmanship which was less and less valued in contemporary art circles. I employed soldering skills I learned working in my dad’s repair shop where he repaired and often times redesigned home appliances due to the lack of spare parts. In his workshop called “Omur Tamirhanesi” or Life Workshop not only he did not produce any trash other then metal saw dust, he also build his inventions out of retired machine parts. To source discarded tin cans (which were sparse at the time) to produce  32 letters I collaborated with a tin shop owner I found in Ankara called “Tin Girl” and my father, thus my first collaborative work. V.A.