We Force

December 2023 - November 2024
ZONGULDAK

In the project titled “Same for Us,” carried out in Karabük in 2020, the artist wrote letters during the time of pandemic and regularly left them at the doors of the apartments on the walking route outside curfew hours. Months later, the artist took a temporary e-mail address for people to participate, and asked them to photograph the areas where they spent the most time at home. Photographs and letters were exhibited in a museum in Ankara.

The project, which was carried out under the name “Encounters,” is aimed to be realized under the name “Meetings” in Zonguldak with a different rhetoric. The “We Force” project will regularly reach random apartments through letters containing artists’ diaries, and after a while, audio recordings will be collected from participants (including everything they want to say, such as confessions, lies, recipes, etc.), who are assumed to have gotten used to the presence of the artists. The meeting invitation will be sent by letter to the participants interacting for the exhibition, and the audio recordings will be arranged around the placement to be made in the shape of a semicircle. The 15 events with participation content, to be held after the meeting/exhibition day, will contribute to the infinity cycle, where the process will never end and a new context will be opened with each person. The large moon statue next to the sound installation is a call to view our relationships as art, while inviting the circles around it to the “We Force” Cosmically, changes on the moon’s gravity on based on its phases represent similarities to the change in the aspects of inter-human attraction in the installation to be made within the context of the project. Bringing art to the forefront as a method of understanding and expressing what we feel, the “We Gravity” project offers a “place” for people's freedom of expression and participation, while interaction is included in the process right from the beginning. Reinforcement of social ties will turn into a network of social relations that keep people together with the idea of trusting each other and acting together.

Özge Yalacak

Born in Karabük in 1996, Özge Yalacak graduated from Zonguldak Bülent Ecevit University (ZBEU) Painting Department in 2019. In 2023, she completed her master’s degree at Hacettepe University, Institute of Fine Arts, Department of Painting with her thesis titled “Relational Art at the Limits of Mediocrity.” The artist participated in various exhibitions, received various awards such as the 37^th Akbank Contemporary Artists Achievement Award in 2019, and as a result of the open call, she was deemed worthy of opening her personal exhibitions titled “Organic Relations Network” in Ankara Museum Evliyagil in 2021 and “On-Site Relationship” in Bodrum Merqezart in 2023. With her portfolio comprising mainly of paintings, space-specific and participatory art, the artist is preparing for PhD.

Çağlar Uzun

Born in 1977 in Ankara, Çağlar Uzun received his doctor of art degree from Hacettepe University, Institute of Fine Arts in 2009. He participated in 5 solo exhibitions and numerous national and international group exhibitions. He received 1 international and 2 national awards. He has works exhibited in private collections. He has been working as an associate professor at ZBEU since 2018. He produces theoretical and practical creations related to painting, installation, photography and public art.

This page is published on 8 December 2023.