Reciprocities: Istanbul and Edmonton
by Lianne McTavish, Professor, History of Art, Design and Visual Culture, Department of Art & Design, University of Alberta
Excerpt from the essay Reciprocities: Istanbul and Edmonton from Synergies 2009, a catalogue that accompanied an exhibition
of the same name in Istanbul, Turkey, January/February, 2009.
... The specificity of place is a theme recurring throughout Synergies 2009. This work is in dialogue with a broader scholarly contemplation of the invention of place, which considers how spaces become meaningful places that contribute to the production of subjectivity and are infused with power relations. A poignant contribution is Helen Gerritzen’s small work called enclosure (2007), in which a delicate wooden fence encircles an empty space, marking it as important. By focusing on the human invention of boundaries, the artist displays how place can be constructed through the arbitrary separation of spaces, even as the borders that manufacture those spaces remain fragile, permeable and subject to change...
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