Türkiye`de kavramsal sanat, cilt 1

Abstract

Anglo- Amerikan Conceptual Art, 1968-1973, not only anti-formal in nature, presented the possibility of a new art system through the efforts of the Art & Language group who used linguistic analysis to investigate all facets of art. They envisioned an art community as an art group working and learning together as seriously as scientists in a laboratory with spectators as informed members of the group. Overlapping art practice with art theory, these artists through continual art related dialogue replaced the gallery/museum with the art journal. By the time Şükrü Aysan returned from Paris in 1975 and introduced Anglo-American Conceptual art possibilities to the Turkish art community, the Art & Language group had only three active members. Together with Ahmet Öktem and Serhat Kiraz, in 1978, Şükrü Aysan formed the Sanat Tanımı Topluluğu (STT) (The Art Definition Group), an art group following the Anglo-Amerikan Conceptual Art model. While Şükrü Aysan, as a stable member of STT, continued to use analytical propositions to question the nature of art, Ahmet Öktem and Serhat Kiraz left the group in the early 1980s. Analysis of Ahmet Öktem and Serhat Kiraz's work showed them to have worked in the direction of Conceptual Art as STT members, but not later in their careers. Likewise, analysis of work by artists, Ayşe Erkmen and Canan Beykal, who exhibited with Öktem and Kiraz in the A, B, C, D exhibitions, showed them to have helped to legitimize the installation and other Anti-formal materials in the Turkish art community, but to have been only marginally influenced by Anglo-American Conceptual Art. In contrast, the work of Şükrü Aysan and the members of STT between 1989-1994 followed the direction set by Anglo-American Conceptual Art. STT artists, like scientists in a laboratory, researched and questioned all facets of art as they searched for the unchangeable in art and a means to visualize mental operations.