Wednesday 19 December 2007

A Few Retrospectives; Cevdet Erek

In advance of Cevdet Erek’s forthcoming exhibition we can rehearse its form as if a musical composition. In such a study the introduction would be Ruler. While this work implies a fixed linear measurement that denotes a complete period or retrospective, it does not set a single tempo, but many, each corresponding to a myriad of personal interpretations. It is perhaps pertinent that this is one of Erek’s most recent works, a project that stems from a residency period spent in Cairo, where civilization first mastered the rule of the ‘golden section’. This system of divine proportion is studied and applied in art, architecture, mathematics and music, disciplines that are all fundamental aspects of Erek’s work. His art is to combine their influence, to propose the essence of an original site-specific situation and subject, resulting in a form of ‘golden section’, or a series of innately human reflections on time and space.

The simple applications of rhythm and compression of time in Ruler are more visually tactile and active in Studio. In this video, which can be described as the refrain of the exhibition, his hands release an embedded rhythm. Like an off-duty percussionist or wind player seen impulsively tapping their thigh, while the memory of the source still lingers, for the viewer the effect is an anonymous pulse. Studio is presented in a scaled-down, sculpted version of the studio where the original act took place. Held captive in their own enclosure, the now involuntary tapping fingers are bolstered by a swinging metronome that perhaps keeps true time, or else attempts to offer a more basic translation of the digits’ infinite performance.

A Few Retrospectives is not an exhibition that proposes any kind of conclusion, because for Erek there are always new renditions to consider as his works’ evolve. But for now the last movement is SSS (Shore, Scene, Soundtrack), a proposal for a performance that imitates nature in order to capture the essence of the sound of the sea as it laps the shore. It is said that the proportions of nature and art follow the same ratio and SSS is in a way a formula that attempts to prove this hypothesis. Its translation of nature takes place via the act of stroking a carpet, a process of recording, interpreting and playing back, through the medium of humanity. The acts and thoughts that make up the essence of SSS have since been published and like a musical score this manuscript is available for anyone to take up and in turn perform their own expression of the composition.