Open Space 3

OPEN SPACE 3*
Text: Murat Alat

Open Space is a humble proposal for life. It is a call for the people of our era who have resorted to sheltering behind walls in order to be protected from the world’s terror and who keep away from the world, in order to crack open the doors that they have locked multiple times. Yes, Open Space is a call for both the artists and the visitors in order to lower their shields and to litter around what they hide inside them even for a moment. If we listen to this invitation and can create a crack where our fragile inner world hidden behind our harsh character can be manifested, we can maybe be purified from our fears that imprison us and be one with the world. Openness is both an opportunity for us to reveal what is inside and to show that we do not have anything secret to fear as well as an interval where we can add others to ourselves when fear is no longer necessary. One is powerful, good, truthful and beautiful when one is together with others.

Open Space is the choreography of the different answers that artists give to the chaos of the world which can quite hurt sometimes. Every work in Open Space is a different manifestation of the effort to create an order from chaos. Whether it overflows from the passages of the human or arises from the incomprehensible functioning of the external world, chaos is a reality that is impossible for one to endure and to accept. One is always full of terror against chaos. All these solid walls, locked doors are humble measures taken against chaos. But all these efforts are predestined to be disappointed. Then maybe one should give up these futile attempts, these efforts to separate chaos from order. Open Space is an opportunity for conversation between chaos and order.

We have an internal and an external world, and in between there are various boundaries that are hard to overcome. We have heard it as such; we accept it as such. What if it is not? Open Space is diligent to combine a bipolar space that has been arbitrarily separated as inside and outside, to establish it as a continuity. The space that we call our internal world – who knows the source of the habit that led to it? – where feelings and thoughts are in motion, and the space that we know as the external world where our body nests and moves are both maybe different aspects of the same thing. These different aspects reveal the points where they are intermingled in Open Space.

What goes on in Open Space happens for all to see. The meaning is neither in the depths behind the one who sees, neither on the tip of the tounge of a sublime authority. The meaning is not a secret that should be solved or learned. It is a structure that is to be built by playing together. The works positioned in Open Space are formed together with the visitors; the meaning occurs when the visitors open up themselves and are included in the game. Therefore, don’t be afraid, go ahead. There is nobody judging you. Spend some time in Open Space. Dwell in Open Space.

*Open Space 3 is the third step of the exhibition series by the artists who respond to Nuri Kuzucan’s invitation.