Tulu Bayar “Traces”

Amos Eno Gallery

[Image: detail, ''Traces'' solo show by Tulu Bayar]

This event has ended.

Amos Eno Gallery presents “Traces,” an exhibition of a mixed-media installation by Tulu Bayar. Bayar’s most recent installation, which draws upon her decade-long exploration of drawing with photographic film utilizes meditative repetition to communicate the idea of oneness: all binary concepts share and are connected to one source. In contrast to an examination of the physical, Bayar’s work focuses on the spiritual essence of wholeness and mysticism that are deeply rooted in Rumi’s teachings. The artist will be creating ephemeral work for visitors during the opening, in call and response with Pianist Sezi Seskir, who will be playing ‘Two Pages’ by Philip Glass, an early work of his from 1968. Please join us for this unique, collaborative performance experience.

“Traces” is composed of several mixed-media works meticulously created from photographic film, ink and resin. Each exhibits an exploration in calligraphic abstraction, performance, drawing, and ebru (Turkish marbling art). Bayar’s meditative compositions of photographic film respond to the traditional Islamic understanding of the spirituality of text, and to Islamic manuscript painting. Repetitious play with material and form lends a performative element to the works, while their intimate size simulates an intensely personal interaction. Regardless of your familiarity with this language, the beauty of the symbolic expression comes to the fore.

Bayar’s practice is informed by her experiences and immediate context as an immigrant artist, and her work is deeply influenced by both her native and adopted cultures. Exoticism, otherness, hybridism, homogeneity, pluralism and containment are some of the concepts that she has been exploring throughout her practice. Bayar is interested in engaging with artistic strategies that blur the boundaries between strict categorizations and binary situations.

The work draws an analogy between how we experience unconscious emotions through repetition and the accumulation of marks, and between the intonation, hesitation, and inflection of sound (which occur independent of sight, then is generated by the mind and mediated by perception). This way of working with unexposed photographic films gives Bayar a privileged relationship to the non-visible, as the work embodies and exposes the thinking process: “I usually start each work with a social issue in mind. Gradually, the pragmatic develops and disintegrates, leaving behind a sense of the assembled material that transcends the literal. This opens a path to connect with the viewers on an emotional level, and it is also the point at which I assume the work is finalized,” she explains.

Tulu Bayar (b. Ankara, Turkey) has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions at museums and galleries in the US and abroad. Her work is part of public collections including but not limited to the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Samuel Dorsky Museum, Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art (Istanbul), and the Textile Museum at George Washington University. Her exhibitions have been covered by international media including NPR, The Irish Times, Afterimage, Photography Quarterly, TRT (National Public Broadcaster of Turkey), the Bushwick Daily and Wall Street Journal. A Fulbright Scholar, she has also received funding from Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, Ténot Foundation, artist-in residency grants from Camac Centre of Art in France and the Center for Photography at Woodstock funded by the Andy Warhol Foundation as well as William Sackett Fellowship through Virginia Center for Creative Arts.

Bayar holds and MFA from the University of Cincinnati and is currently the chair of the Department of Art and Art History at Bucknell University.