Illumination, 2009, Digital Photograph, Courtesy of Ai Weiwei Studio & Sakip Sabanci Museum / Ai Weiwei Studio ve Sakıp Sabancı Müzesi izniyle.
In Turkey before seeing his artworks, we have seen his social media account (Instagram), his selfies, we have seen his way of protesting government authorities, censorship, media and politics and how used social media to protest everything. Because of his popularity in the art world, many people in Turkey tried to take selfies with him and with his artworks. Everyone Instagrammed every single work of him. In the meantime, there were lots of journalists writing about the artworks and the importance of Ai Weiwei. Maybe not many people would appraise the artworks in this exhibition as a reflection of the failure of systems, the rise of censorship and injustice. Instead of looking at artworks with suspicion, Turkish audience took many photographs and Turkey appreciated the boldness of the artist by giving him Hrant Dink human right’s award. Long story short; this is how we have experienced an Ai Weiwei exhibition in Istanbul. However, little did we know, the works exhibited in Sakıp Sabancı Museum, also depicts our life in Turkey.
Ai Wei Wei is called the renaissance figure of the Chinese avant-garde (Contemporary Chinese Artists, Half-Life of a Dream, Jeff Kelly). He is considered as one of the prominent figures of today’s contemporary art. It is possible to see censorship, social problems, and suffering. It is a fact that he makes us question refugee crisis, politics, censorship and bigoted values that society brings. And, if we prefer to look at the works at Sakıp Sabancı Museum from these themes, we can see a reflection on Turkish society and how we live.
Although Turkish audience has witnessed some well-written articles on works of Ai Weiwei and explanation of certain artistic approach, the between lines aesthetics in the exhibition came to afore. It is a fact, we do not need any of these when trying to understand works of Ai. The reason is there: You can see everything with your bare eyes. He creates for one reason and it is to show us the unsaid truth about the system that made the world go round. He uses his art as a medium of showing the hardships of the system and how he does it, is also very simple and easy to understand. In fact, the works also contain scenes from our lives in Turkey. Cause many people thought works are about China and Chinese authorities, however, the reality lies within the works: The works of Ai refers to all authorities that take power as a weapon.
Study of Perspective, 1995-2011, Tiananmen Square, 1995, Black-and-white photograph. Courtesy of Ai Weiwei Studio & Sakip Sabanci Museum / Ai Weiwei Studio ve Sakıp Sabancı Müzesi izniyle.
That’s why, no need to linger around between the lines, it is our duty to understand Ai’s works as Turkish audience, cause we are among those who have been censored, exposed to the ill-fated darkness of power and stuck up with social values and traditions. And maybe it would be fair to read Ai’s İstanbul exhibition as a citizen living in an inauspicious system rather than looking the ‘aesthetic beauty’ in it. Maybe, this time, it would be better to leave the aesthetic concerns and look to the more mundane approach to the politics and power. And Ai Weiwei makes us remember and feel the absolute power of authorities are living with us and we cannot escape the reality of it.
However, what we all did in Turkey. We all saw these artworks are made because of Chinese authorities and rather than thinking about ourselves we blamed other authorities. And we thought it is our duty to share Ai’s works online, cause we are responsible for supporting freedom in the world. Maybe we needed this. However, what we needed to see is we are not very different from Ai and what he has experienced.
In this sense maybe it would better to recall what the artist wrote in his article titled How Censorship Works published in The New York Times. He wrote: Whenever the state controls or blocks information, it not only reasserts its absolute power; it also elicits from the people whom it rules a voluntary submission to the system and an acknowledgment of its dominion. This, in turn, supports the axiom of the debased: Accept dependency in return for practical benefits.’
He continues as: ‘The system rewards ordinary people for their cooperation automatically; there is no need for them to compete for the rewards. Managers of artistic and cultural projects, though, need to do more than that; they need to show proactively that they “get it” and will accommodate the authoritarians and protect their public image. They know that if anything causes unhappiness higher up, a project, and perhaps an organization, will be scrubbed.’
All the works in the exhibition are the result of these ideas. The exhibition focuses on porcelain works and also named after his porcelain creation ‘Ai Weiwei On Porcelain’ includes more than hundred works on objects Ai made. Ai refers both traditional Chinese handicrafts (porcelain is part of China’s traditional handicraft) and Western art history with his porcelain objects. The works at the exhibition organized on three different concepts such as ‘appropriation’, ‘reproduction’ and ‘iconoclasm.’ There is also a range from his early 1970’s works that were reproduced for this first solo show in Istanbul. That’s why the exhibition is taken as one of the most important contemporary art exhibitions of 2017 in Turkey.
The exhibition scrutinizes the themes of Ai’s works such as cultural history, art history, authenticity and also the transformation of value systems throughout different eras, in the meantime, the artist calls Turkish audiences to think about their own social life and living.
In a way, this exhibition at Sakıp Sabancı Museum calls us to put the artistic approach of Ai on a side and try to adapt the meaning of the works into our lives. And in a country such as Turkey, while everything is changing in our daily lives, we encounter many different hardships in terms of censor and power, it is easy to adapt become more aware of the realities of Ai’s works.
Tragic artworks and selfies
In the exhibition, shown among Ai’s most tragic artworks, Porcelain Rebar, connotes tragedy of an earthquake. The work refers to 2008 Sichuan earthquake, which killed more than 70,000. The work also commemorates the children died in the earthquake. It is said that the buildings (among these buildings there is a school) is made of wrong or less material and that’s why the earthquake resulted in that much death.
Another work of Ai’s unspoken thoughts is ‘Blossom,’ bunch of beautiful porcelain flowers, which attracted lots of Instagrammers. This artwork may be the most Instagrammed artwork in the whole exhibition. Despite the beauty of it, ‘Blossom’ depicts us a very tragic story. The work is created as part of prisoner bathrooms. Ai first used these flowers in the bathroom sinks and toilets in an installation depicting prisoner cells, which refers to those who are imprisoned wrongly.
However, when advertising the exhibition, ‘Blossom’ and ‘Porcelain Rebar’ worked really well. Many people put the photos of these works over and over maybe without knowing their meaning and addressing them as simple artworks. Maybe in a way, this was the thing that Ai wanted to be. As Hyperallergic writer Sarah Rose Sharp has written: ‘By creating exposure to lovely objects imbued with meaning, are we planting seeds for critical thinking about society — or are we just creating a backdrop forever more selfies?’ The exposure of these lovely objects surely raised a question on the situation of the misery we witness.
Reviewing another Ai Weiwei exhibition in Michigan’s sculpture park, Sharp wrote: ‘In another botanical wing, I witnessed a family group cheerfully posing for a portrait with the colorful porcelain twists that mimics the rebar commemorating the children who died in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.’ In this case, witnessing needs more than what it takes.
In Istanbul, we witnessed the same thing and it seemed like portraits, posing, selfies are all a part of Ai’s world of art.
Remains, 2014, Porcelain, Courtesy of Ai Weiwei Studio & Sakip Sabanci Museum / Ai Weiwei Studio ve Sakıp Sabancı Müzesi izniyle.
Looking through the public eye
Even though most works of Ai raised attention by many and especially by Chinese authorities, a certain series of works, which refers to refugee crisis around the world are among the most criticized works of the artist.
Ai has used porcelain plates depicting refugee crisis. On these plates, the viewers see refugee scenes that they saw on television every night. People in the boat, people sailing away and drowned bodies
Ai has depicted three-year-old drowned boy Aylan Kurdi in one of those plates. The incident that happened in Turkey’s coastal side Bodrum was perceived as a disgrace for politicians. On the other hand, the work raised eyebrows in the contemporary art world saying that why Ai has used such a tragedy in his works. About Ai’s work that he lies down on the beach and pretending as Aylan Kurdi, Jake Chapman criticized the artist saying that ‘There is something pathetic about Ai Weiwei going to lie down on the beach to aestheticize others people’s misery.’
However, Ai’s all works are about other people’s misery. Depicting refugee crisis or pretending to be one of them or creating porcelain flowers are all results of misery and pain. On the other hand, his famous work Sunflower Seeds (the work that makes Ai an international artist, stands as artist’s take on globalization, mass production and Ai’s childhood, hunger and time of Mao), has been aestheticized Ai’s own misery resulting from his own experience in life.
What is the main question is how the public conceives this and how they respond to these works. While many people in the exhibition prefer to take photos the question remains: How do we relate to artworks and do we really understand the essence or we are here for taking photos and appreciating them on social media. In fact, we can say that all we are interested in is the social value of these artworks, not the reality that surrounds them. So as a result, we do deserve aestheticism of Ai. So the question remains ‘what is aesthetics’ if we are to talk about Ai’s works. Or as sharing photographs on social media do we try to increase the exposure and try to show that we are responsible citizens and we care about freedom and politics?
Whatever it is, the misery remains and as Ai makes artworks everyone will continue to share. So the exposure will go on, so as the art…
Ai Weiwei On Porcelain, 12.9.2017 – 28.1.2018, Sakip Sabanci Museum. http://www.sakipsabancimuzesi.org/