News from artists 1

Recently, I asked all participating artists to inform me about upcoming exhibitions and other interesting news items. And today I received something from Halil. Centre Georges Pompidou has acquired his Dengbejs video, which he made for the last Documenta. Apparently, Halil is the first Turkish artist whose work is part of the collection.

"Dengbejs is about non-western modernities. It’s a 15 minute video, shot from an ironic point of view. At the opening scene of the video we witness a Dengbej ritual in a traditional Mesopotamian setup. The interior of the house is decorated in a typical South-Eastern Turkish style, a region where Kurds are the majority. The Dengbejs, who have been performing as oral historians and myth-tellers for centuries, are presenting their acts. These last representatives of a dying tradition, narrate the untold social and political legends, composed of love, rebellion and tragedies only through their voices.

After documenting the dengbej ritual, the camera travels to the exterior of the house. The video captures a mountain house where the ritual is being held. While the camera zooms out the audience realizes that this very house is not located in the heart of nature but on the top of a mirror-windowed plaza in the center of one of the biggest cities of Turkey, Diyarbakir. The video ends with a bird’s eye view of the chaotic structure of the city."