Organized by the
Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV) and sponsored VitrA, with the
support of the Turkish Ministry of Culture & Tourism and the Istanbul Stock
Exchange (main contributor), the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial is still running,
and with even more exhibitions, outdoor installations, digital workshops,
discussion panels, film screenings, and children’s workshops. Curated by
Mariana Pestana, Sumitra Upham, and Billie Muraben, the biennial, entitled
“Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one” preceded by exhibitions at Pera
Museum and ARK Kültür (that attracted heavy attention from visitors until
November 15, 2020) is continuing to host projects from different countries and
across a wide-breath of disciplines both on the streets of Istanbul and online.
The various urban interventions, alongside research projects and videos shall
carry on evolving until April 30, 2021.
Istanbul street projects are open to visitors as part of this year’s Design
Biennial. At the Beşiktaş Ferry Terminal are “Point Cloud” by Soft Baroque,
which invites us to imagine what a world designed by machines would be like,
alongside Soraia Gomes Teixeira’s “Public Therapy Tools” a series of devices
that try and solve the issue of social distancing. At the Karaköy Ferry
Terminal is “Sobya’t Thawra – The Revolution Woodstove” designed by Bits to
Atoms and BeirutMakers, and inspired by the civil protests that took place
across Lebanon in 2019. At Moda Beach Park is Eli Bensusan’s “Sundial of the
Blind” inspired by the district of Moda and its history. At the Fenerbahçe Park
Community Garden is “Germinator” a fodder cabinet by SKREI, Francisca
Sottomayor, and Sofia Magalhães. Germinator is open to the public between 11.00
and 17.00 every Saturday, between until November 15. “Dansbana! Kalamış!” by
“Dansbana!” is a dance-floor inviting everyone to sway there hips at Kalamış
Park, as of the second week of November onwards.
Within the scope of “Critical Food Program”, one of the three pillars of the
5th Istanbul Design Biennial, a new video has been published every Sunday since
October 18 on İKSV’s YouTube channel, on the biennial’s website, and on e-flux
Architecture. The digital video series asks how food shopping, supply, and
consumption tie into the ecological, economic, and geopolitical conditions
affecting today’s culture. New episodes will continue to be launched until
March 2021.
Undertaking the Experience Sponsorship of the Biennial, Digilogue uses
augmented reality to together Soraia Gomes Teixeira’s Public Therapy Tools (at
the Beşiktaş Ferry Terminal) within the scope of the Biennial’s New Citizenship
Rituals programme. This augmented reality installation responds to itself by
raising questions about palpability and the impossibility of touch in the
digital world. Digilogue moreover also invites users to virtually interact with
the Revisiting Empathy narrative using two Instagram filters, Empathy Aura and
Empathy Plane, inspired by the biennale’s visual identity.
