The 15th Istanbul Biennial, entitled “a good neighbour” and curated by artist duo Elmgreen & Dragset, reveals the participating artists of this year’s edition, which takes place from 16 September to 12 November. Organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV), the 15th Istanbul Biennial brings together artworks by 55 artists from 32 countries, all addressing different notions of home, belonging and neighbourhood. The biennial takes place in six neighbouring venues: Istanbul Modern, Galata Greek Primary School, Ark Kültür, Pera Museum, Yoğunluk Atelier, and Küçük Mustafa Paşa Hammam.
The curators Elmgreen & Dragset says about the biennial: “Your neighbour might be someone who lives quite a different life from yours. And hopefully you, unlike many politicians lately, are not the one who chooses to deal with your fear of otherness by fencing yourself off. The artists in the 15th Istanbul Biennial raise questions about ideas of home, neighbourhood, belonging and co-existence from multiple perspectives. Some of the artworks examine how our domestic living conditions and modes have changed and how our neighbourhoods have transformed, while others focus on how we cope with today’s geopolitical challenges on a micro-level. The Biennial takes its form from the invited artists’ personal or analytical statements: an engaging mixture of hopes and visions, of sadness and indignation, of history and present day.”
About Elmgreen & Dragset
Elmgreen & Dragset (Michael Elmgreen, dr.h.c. and Ingar Dragset, dr.h.c.) have worked together as an artist duo since 1995. Their practice spans many genres, including installation, sculpture, performance, and theatre. Their work has been included in the Istanbul (2013, 2011, 2001), Liverpool (2012), Singapore (2011), Moscow (2011, 2007), Venice (2009, 2003), Gwangju (2006, 2002), São Paulo (2002), and Berlin (1998) biennials. The artists were shortlisted for the Hugo Boss Prize, Guggenheim Museum, New York in 2000 and won the Preis der Nationalgalerie, Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin in 2002. In 2012, Elmgreen & Dragset were selected for London’s Fourth Plinth Commission in Trafalgar Square. They were awarded honorary doctorates by the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in 2015.
Elmgreen & Dragset have curated the group exhibition The Others at König Galerie in Berlin in November 2016. Previous curatorial projects include The Collectors at the Danish and Nordic Pavilions at the 53rd Venice Biennale in 2009, marking the first-ever merging of two national pavilions to present a single exhibition, which received a Special Mention entitled ‘Curating Worlds’. In 2013, the duo curated A Space Called Public, a wide-ranging temporary public art project throughout the city of Munich, with the aim of generating new conversations about the concept of public space today. The same year, with their exhibition Tomorrow at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the artists designed a setting in which they staged paintings, furniture, and artefacts from the museum’s permanent collection. Earlier curatorial projects include Not a Drop But the Fall, together with Susanne Pfeffer, Künstlerhaus Bremen (2005) and Update, a performance-based festival that was part of Copenhagen’s European Capitals of Culture program (1996).
