An Imagined Corner of Istanbul

 

Artist’s Statement: An Imagined Corner of Istanbul

Returning from my residency in Istanbul, I found myself captivated by the city’s layered history—its interplay of the seen and the unseen, the tangible and the ephemeral. Inspired by my visits to the Archaeological Museum, I began by creating 3D-printed works in white PLA that evoked the grandeur of Greco-Roman statues and architectural fragments. These pieces reflected the timeless elegance of marble, echoing classical antiquity. Yet, as I immersed myself further in the textures and stories of Istanbul, I realised that the materiality of these prints, though precise and striking, did not fully capture my emotional connection with the beauty, delicacy, and lineage of Turkish objects from the Ottoman era.

It was in working with old, heavy storage boxes that my vision began to take shape. These functional, utilitarian objects carried a sense of weight and presence that resonated with the lived history I sought to explore. Their worn surfaces bore traces of use, hinting at their own journeys and purposes. To these boxes, I added laser-engraved patterns and images that I synthesised from photographs taken during my residency. Digitally manipulated and burned into the wood, these designs incorporated the intricate delicacy of Ottoman motifs and the refined craftsmanship I observed in objects from that era.

These engraved boxes became containers of memory—physical embodiments of cultural heritage, reimagined through my own creative lens. When arranged on a rug, they formed a vignette, an imagined corner of Istanbul that evokes both domesticity and the confluence of past and present. The rug beneath them plays an essential role in this narrative. Its patterns, reminiscent of Turkish or Anatolian designs, anchor the scene in a space that feels both intimate and symbolic, echoing the beauty of Ottoman domestic interiors. Together, the rug and the boxes create a space that invites reflection on lineage, craftsmanship, and the fragility of memory.

The laser engraving process itself became a metaphor for the balance I hoped to achieve in this work: the act of inscribing these designs onto aged boxes reflects the interplay between permanence and delicacy, preservation and reinterpretation. I left elements of wear and tear on the boxes deliberately, allowing their imperfections to speak of their age and the adventures they may have carried. This tension between the old and the new, the historical and the personal, mirrors my exploration of Istanbul—a city where the past constantly reshapes the present.

The scene was also in part inspired by a visit to the Pera Museum, where I encountered a partial reconstruction of a beautiful 1950s apartment. That space evoked a particular time and place in Istanbul’s history, a moment of elegance and cultural vibrancy before the disruptions of later decades. My work reflects on this history implicitly, offering a space for contemplation rather than provocation. The imagined corner I have created is not an attempt to replicate reality but to distil a feeling—a sense of beauty, fragility, and resilience that honours Istanbul’s rich cultural tapestry.

Through these pieces, I hope to invite viewers into a dialogue with the objects and the space they inhabit. The boxes and the rug together create a narrative of interconnectedness, one that blurs the boundaries between the monumental and the everyday, the classical and the Ottoman. This work is a tribute to the enduring power of material culture to connect us to history, memory, and the intricate web of human experience.

By recreating this imagined corner of Istanbul, I aim to reflect not only on the city’s layers of history but also on the ways in which we, as individuals and societies, inherit, preserve, and reinterpret the legacies of the past. It is a space of reflection—of beauty found in the quiet marks left by time and of the stories that objects carry, waiting for us to see them anew.