Ani Çelik Arevyan’s latest photograph series “Traces of This World” can be seen at Galeri Nev İstanbul opening on January 10. Arevyan’s third solo exhibition at the gallery can be visited until February 8.
Arevyan’s “Traces of This World” series offers a commentary on the effacement of reference to reality in its contemporary understanding. Transpositions between digital and physical realm and the digital compel us to suspect the effort takes an image to ground itself at spatial and temporal levels of experience. In her latest series Arevyan positions temporality at the core of her work since the predominant visual reference to turbulent movement can only be comprehended with the existence of time. As Arevyan’s photographs problematize our position in time they lead us through a world unknown for us. Repetition and the dream-like status of the figures obscure their relation with reality.
According to Arevyan nor the position of figures in time is determined neither their reality. The floating figures seem to be spinning in a vortex with postures suggesting a falling body in space. The traces of perpetual movement also pose questions about temporality. Weaving all these queries together Arevyan aims to position photography as a tool through which ontological doubts are reformulated and addressed. The images of models wearing artist’s own clothes are digitally mastered and replicated. Arevyan’s interference with the figure operates both at the bodily and digital re-mastering levels; through this two-folded artistic gesture Arevyan forms a basis for questioning reality, a hallmark of photography practice in the context of contemporary art.