ECNP Galeri will exhibit the kilims of Alev Ebüzziya, a prominent ceramic artist who designed “simple, ‘non-designer’, diligent kilims for everyone…”.
“Two years ago, I went to dhoku’s store at the Grand Bazaar to find a kilim. I asked them if they would weave a tailor-made kilim for me and they said yes. I asked for a pencil, a piece of paper, a ruler and color samples, sat down on the floor and designed the kilim I wanted while drinking tea! What a special treat it was!!!
When they asked me if I would be interested in designing other kilims, I said I’d love to.
dhoku is a motivated and open-minded company which has been creating successful works in its workshop for years. I went back to Paris and spent my whole time designing kilims. My wish was to see the production of non-designer, simple and affordable kilims that can be used anywhere. Easier said than done! I do hope that I reached my aim!”
Alev Ebüzziya’s kilims combine design with a traditional production process, use organic, pure and the most natural wools colored with plant dyes except some special hues. The exhibition will open at ECNP Gallery at 18:00 on 7 April 2016.
Alev Ebüzziya Siesbye was born in 1938. From 1955 to 1958 she studied sculpture at the Istanbul Academy of Fine Arts. She spent two years as a production worker in the ceramic factories at Höhr-Grenzhausen. In 1963 she moved to Copenhagen, where she worked first for the Royal Danish Porcelaine Factories and since 1969 has her own private workshop. She has designed for both Rosenthal and Royal Copenhagen.
The work of Ebüzziya reaffirms the essential need for the memory. Not the immediate memory that keeps us functioning conveniently from day to day, but above all the atavistic, remote memory; growing slowly by sedimentation, the memory both of techniques and of feelings and ideas that ensure the permanence of mankind as eternal creator, the most perfect approximation to any concept of God, universal.
In the year of 2002, she has a retrospective exhibition at the Danish Museum of Decorative Art in Copenhagen followed by an other retrospective at Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum in Istanbul.
Her works are included in the collections of Museum of decorative Arts, Copenhagen; Museum Boymans van Beuningen, Rotterdam; City Museum, Helsingborg; National Museum, Stockholm; Museum of Decorative Arts, Cologne; Victoria & Albert Museum, London; Kunst Museum, Aarhus; Palmer Museum of Art, Pennsylvania State University, Pennsylvania; Museum of Decorative Arts, Ghent; Hetjens Museum, Düsseldorf; Museum of Decorative Arts, Hamburg; Kestner Museum Hannover; L.O. Skolen, Helsingör; Danish State Art Foundation, Copenhagen; Museé Bellerive, Zürich; Museum Het Kruithuis, Hertogenbosch; Nordenfjeldske Kunstindustrimuseet, Trondheim; Württembergisches Landesmuseum, Stuttgart; Kunstmuseet Trapholt, Kolding; Vestlandisk Kunstindustri Museet, Bergen; Coburg Museum, Coburg; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; F.N.A.C. for Museé des Arts Décoratifs, Paris; Schleswig-Holsteinisches Landesmuseum, Oslo; Kunst Industri Museum, Oslo; Princessehof Museum, Leuwarden; Cooper-Hewitt Museum, New York; Royal Scottish Museum, Edinburg; Ulster Museum, Belfast and State Museum of Painting and Sculpture, Ankara.
Since 1987 she lives and works in Paris.
dhoku
With three generations of Turkish rug experience in his family, Memet Gureli started his own rug company in 1989. After years of success, Memet recognized the new trends in home furnishings and designs and wanted to move his company toward contemporary rug production. In 2002, a new product line was launched called EthniCon Vintage, beautifully blending antique, ethnic Turkish kilims into one-of-a-kind contemporary pieces. A new shop was opened in the Grand Bazaar featuring these new product lines. In 2007, a new brand called “dhoku”, which means “texture” in Turkish, was launched. The dhoku brand now includes seven product lines of stunning new contemporary rug styles, which are hand woven on looms in Anatolia or created by selecting amazing antique rugs and bringing them back to life.
Burcu Büyükünal and Selen Özus are two jewelry designer-makers who are following our footsteps. Burcu, an ex-student of ours, worked with in our studio from 2003 to 2009; Selen on the other hand has spent time in the same studio as an intern. Since 2011 they have their own studio, Maden Contemporary Jewellery Studio, where they teach and pursue their creative careers.
'Side by Side' is two solo but parallel shows, where we will exhibit their wall pieces as well as their new jewelry.
The Closest - Selen Özus
'My autoportrait works entitled “The closest” are the products of an interpretive process of visualizing myself which resulted in conflicts and clashes. The period started with shut-eye drawings: My white on white faces that only reveal themselves with a closer look, are chosen to define myself. Porcelain works emerged as the variable reflections of transparent and delicate materials gone with the flow.'
'It all starts with the valuable beauties and ugliness that surround us: People, being human, lights, spaces, relations, memories, nature and details. The sensations created by everybody and everything awaken a desire to produce. In fact, all shapens up while paying gently attention to the details. From then on my sole aim is to retreat to my secured world and to concretize what I see with my feelings… to reflect the combination of brain and heart.'
'While producing, drawings become objects, objects become art jewellery. Once my strong feelings balanced, the rest passes to the piece.'
Let it... - Burcu Büyükünal
'Let it… is a work that began to appear in my mind when I lost myself in the details of Abel Mort sculpture by Emile Feugère des Fort in Musée d’Orsay. It emerges from these details and changes its direction under the influence of the natural and obligatory course of life. It is fiction but it is real.'
'Let it exist, let it cease, let it come, let it go, let it stay, let it appear, let it conceal, let it decay, let it split, let it (them) gather, let it unite, let it be remembered, let it be forgotten, let it out, let it in, let it get lost, let it be found, let it become ugly, let it turn beautiful…'
'Among my works, there are designed products along with functional and nonfunctional, artistic and arbitrary pieces that I cannot classify. Contemporary jewellery, which is my main field, comes and goes between these two related disciplines, stands closer to one of them time to time. I sometimes focus on a technique, a material or a visual data around me and create links among them while revealing my own point of view. I crave to ask uncommon questions and find alternative answers to them. Even though I enjoy sticking to my habits in the process of creation, I find these shifts nourishing and exciting. I believe creating and making is a childlike addiction. That’s why my studio is my living room.'
The exhibition will run 3 - 26 March 2016, everyday except Sundays.
As we are sure you have followed, we took part in a very creative and meaningful project organized by Paşabahçe Stores. Omnia Project brought together 18 designers and three talented glass artists to create the future of glass art.
The collection aims to bring together tradition, culture and design. So each of designer, Ela and Nazan separately, has created new objects where they re-defined the objects' traditional use, changed traditional objects' forms, colors, has ventured to expand the glass's habitat and its manufacturing possibilities.
A great video that puts together the process of the project reflects how pleasant it was for all the participants.
At the opening party at Bomonti Ada, we had a chance to see all the objects together along side ours. We were all impressed and happily surprised by the wide variety of objects. Below are a few photos from the opening and our pieces.
Nazan's Leaves Vases are in three different shapes; she is most familiar with these shapes coming from the trees that she often sees in her day to day life in Istanbul. Their colors ranging from red to green to brown reflect the passage of seasons and how these beautiful forms are influenced by it.
Evil eyes by Nazan are three dimensional, you can see them from everywhere and they follow you everywhere.
Doodles on a paper came to life as vases and bowls, decorated with traditional decoration techniques of cuts and gilding.
Ela's tea glasses called Zarife reflect her keen interest in doilies.
Most objects belonging to Omnia project are on sale at Paşabahçe stores, some will be available in the future. In stores they are nicely displayed at a separate display with the designer's name. We hope you will like them as much as we enjoyed creating them.
We have made it! Fikir Dökümü / Idea Casting exhibition is open as of last Saturday.
We loved every step of the preparations, from 3D printing of the models, to casting, to the design of the exhibition components. We loved the idea so much that, we will do more of them, for sure...
The opening reception made it worth all the more. We were joined by so many friends and familiar faces, some of them visiting the new gallery for the first time. Most of the exhibiting artists were also present, they saw their pieces cast in bronze for the first time.
We opened our new gallery and workshop in a new address after 18 years...
Our gallery and workshop is united in this new venue, you can watch how we make jewelry or see our jewelry on display from 1990's to today. This year we are celebrating our 20th year. If you are around come and say hello:)
