Opening / Εγκαίνια / Açılış:
13.02.2019 17:00
Exhibition / Έκθεση / Sergi:
14.02.2019-01.03.2019
The exhibition will be open between 9:00-17:00 every day.
(except for the weekends)
Sergi her gün 9:00-17:00 saatleri arasında gezilebilir.
(Hafta sonu hariç)
Address / Διεύθυνση / Adres:
The Arabahmet Culture and Arts Center
Kaymakamzade Avenue, Sht. Mehmet Huseyin Street, No:5, Nicosia, Cyprus
Arabahmet Kültür ve Sanat Evi Kaymakamzade Mahallesi, Şht. Mehmet Hüseyin Sokaki No:5, Lefkoşa, Kıbrıs
Contact / Επικοινωνία / İletişim:
Rabia Harmanşah rharmansah@gmail.com
“Living backwards!” Alice repeated in great astonishment. “I never heard of such a thing!”
“–but there’s one great advantage in it, that one’s memory works both ways.”
“I’m sure mine only works one way,” Alice remarked. “I can’t remember things before they happen.”
“It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,” the Queen remarked. Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
About the Exhibition
What is the direction of memory? Does memory really work only backward? This exhibition is a collection of diverse readings of the past, present and future through the loud silence of sacred spaces.
The past is highly fractured and strategically reassembled in Cyprus. The memories of the past have been transforming since the Greek and Turkish communities fell apart in 1974. On the one hand, there is longing for a lost past and for a lost future, and on the other hand, a need for creating a new present and future. The reference to past is omnipresent in all narratives related to now and onward. Temporalities turn into permanence, permanence is absent and only imagined. A 58-year old displaced Greek Cypriot man from Rizokarpaso summarizes it with his wise words [interview in 2012]: “Some people could only bring with them their memories and nothing else.”
About the project
This exhibition is based on the ethnographic fieldwork project conducted by Rabia Harmanşah in 2010-2012. The project examines the practices of memory-making and forgetting at sacred sites in Cyprus after the ethnic conflict and 1974 partition of the island. The exhibition is designed to share this research with the people of Cyprus and to stimulate a bi-communal dialogue on shared spaces and ‘alternative’ readings of the past. The exhibition is curated and designed by Ersan Ocak and Aslı Tanrıkulu.
The exhibition is generously funded by the Wenner-Gren Foundation Engaged Anthropology Grant.
* Please note that the data collected through interviews within the scope of the qualitative research shall not be considered as representing Greek or Turkish communities.
