Mustafa Hulusi
01 May - 13 Jun 2008
Mustafa Hulusi
Exstacy
1 May – 13 June 2008
New Bond Street
“If we add to this dread the blissful ecstasy which, prompted by the same fragmentation of the principium individuationis, rises up from man’s innermost core, indeed from nature, we are vouchsafed a glimpse into the nature of the Dionysiac, most immediately understandable to us in the analogy of intoxication. Under the influence of the narcotic potion hymned by all primitive men and peoples, or in the powerful approach of spring, joyfully penetrating the whole of nature, those Dionysiac urges are awakened, and as they grow more intense, subjectivity becomes a complete forgetting of the self.”
Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
Max Wigram Gallery is pleased to announce the third solo show at the gallery of London-based artist Mustafa Hulusi. The exhibition brings together two seemingly dissimilar elements of Hulusi’s practice: Large-scale, photo-realist paintings of almond blossom against blue sky and the bold, geometrical black and white ‘Expander’ motif paintings. The amalgamation of figurative and abstract works presents apparently contradictory formal concerns, further developing Hulusi’s inquiries into diverse visual strategies – Socialist realist propaganda, corporate advertising, Modernist abstraction – and the political function of images.
The mis-spelt title of the exhibition – Exstacy – nods towards the recreational drug used in the sub-culture of late eighties house music. While the ‘Expander’ image suggests optical distortion and phsycheldelia, the visually saturated figurative paintings invoke the euphoria of drug-induced experience. The etymology of Ecstasy (from ’Ex-stasis’ to be outside oneself) suggests a ‘beyond’, a trance-like state of rapture or exaltation, outside of rational thought. One can see the human will to locate this experience, as a driving force in artistic creativity and religious mysticism (Buddhism, Sufism) throughout history. The significance of the title makes this distant historical connection between Ancient Greece and the trance-like, hedonistic states of ‘rave’ culture.
The Dionysiac spirit inspires the visual excess and canivalesque revelry in Hulusi’s imagery. The figurative paintings surround the gallery space, enclosing the viewer in the heightened colours and soft focus of a blissful landscape. Alongside these works, the hard-edged ‘Expander’ paintings evoke an idea of the ‘infinite’, of unboundedness – turning away from the tangible world, towards a spiritual, or mystical, knowledge of a transcendent state. The works in the exhibition pertain to an excessive sensation of visual pleasure, a celebratory glorification of art and its ‘Divine’ potential.
Mustafa Hulusi (b. 1971) is a London born and based Turkish Cypriot. In 2007 he represented the Republic of Cyprus at the 52nd International Exhibition of Contemporary Art of La Biennale di Venezia. Solo exhibitions in 2007 include A-Foundation, Liverpool, and Max Wigram Gallery. Since 2002 selected group exhibitions include When We Build, Let Us Think That We Build Forever, BALTIC, Gateshead, UK; Into Me Out of Me at P.S.1/MOMA (NY) and Kunst-Werke (Berlin); East International 05, Norwich Art Gallery (Norwich); This is England, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art
For further information, please contact the gallery at press@maxwigram.com
Exstacy
1 May – 13 June 2008
New Bond Street
“If we add to this dread the blissful ecstasy which, prompted by the same fragmentation of the principium individuationis, rises up from man’s innermost core, indeed from nature, we are vouchsafed a glimpse into the nature of the Dionysiac, most immediately understandable to us in the analogy of intoxication. Under the influence of the narcotic potion hymned by all primitive men and peoples, or in the powerful approach of spring, joyfully penetrating the whole of nature, those Dionysiac urges are awakened, and as they grow more intense, subjectivity becomes a complete forgetting of the self.”
Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
Max Wigram Gallery is pleased to announce the third solo show at the gallery of London-based artist Mustafa Hulusi. The exhibition brings together two seemingly dissimilar elements of Hulusi’s practice: Large-scale, photo-realist paintings of almond blossom against blue sky and the bold, geometrical black and white ‘Expander’ motif paintings. The amalgamation of figurative and abstract works presents apparently contradictory formal concerns, further developing Hulusi’s inquiries into diverse visual strategies – Socialist realist propaganda, corporate advertising, Modernist abstraction – and the political function of images.
The mis-spelt title of the exhibition – Exstacy – nods towards the recreational drug used in the sub-culture of late eighties house music. While the ‘Expander’ image suggests optical distortion and phsycheldelia, the visually saturated figurative paintings invoke the euphoria of drug-induced experience. The etymology of Ecstasy (from ’Ex-stasis’ to be outside oneself) suggests a ‘beyond’, a trance-like state of rapture or exaltation, outside of rational thought. One can see the human will to locate this experience, as a driving force in artistic creativity and religious mysticism (Buddhism, Sufism) throughout history. The significance of the title makes this distant historical connection between Ancient Greece and the trance-like, hedonistic states of ‘rave’ culture.
The Dionysiac spirit inspires the visual excess and canivalesque revelry in Hulusi’s imagery. The figurative paintings surround the gallery space, enclosing the viewer in the heightened colours and soft focus of a blissful landscape. Alongside these works, the hard-edged ‘Expander’ paintings evoke an idea of the ‘infinite’, of unboundedness – turning away from the tangible world, towards a spiritual, or mystical, knowledge of a transcendent state. The works in the exhibition pertain to an excessive sensation of visual pleasure, a celebratory glorification of art and its ‘Divine’ potential.
Mustafa Hulusi (b. 1971) is a London born and based Turkish Cypriot. In 2007 he represented the Republic of Cyprus at the 52nd International Exhibition of Contemporary Art of La Biennale di Venezia. Solo exhibitions in 2007 include A-Foundation, Liverpool, and Max Wigram Gallery. Since 2002 selected group exhibitions include When We Build, Let Us Think That We Build Forever, BALTIC, Gateshead, UK; Into Me Out of Me at P.S.1/MOMA (NY) and Kunst-Werke (Berlin); East International 05, Norwich Art Gallery (Norwich); This is England, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art
For further information, please contact the gallery at press@maxwigram.com