İThe retrospective of İnci Eviner, put together by Istanbul Modern, showcases the artist’s creative process from the 1980s to the present. It allows us to see the development and transformation of her rich search for expression, which extends from drawing, painting, and video to installation, photography, and sculpture. The presentation of Eviner’s artistic output is not strictly chronological, but rather interweaves past and present, and even incorporates the exhibition space itself.
A pioneering artist who has been influential in the transformation of Turkish contemporary art, Eviner has developed a unique mode of expression regarding the different states of womanhood, gender, and the politics of identity in their collective, political, and sociocultural aspects. Investigating the historical, discursive, and unconscious processes that influence our views of female identity starting in childhood, the artist defines womanhood as a field of limitless possibility that does not fit any single image or concept. Exploring the quotidian gestures of women, Eviner not only questions but challenges the modes of representation judged appropriate for women and the prohibitions that engender these representations.
In terms of the diversity of her areas of interest and research, İnci Eviner is undoubtedly one of the most creative and contemporary artists of her generation. The exhibition brings together an inventory that spans close to forty years and reveals the rich and profound connections she establishes both with herself and with the unity of art, culture, history, nature, and the unconscious that makes us human.
The exhibition titled “Who’s Inside You?” can be seen at Istanbul Modern until 23 October.
