The Showroom

Can Altay

13 Oct - 27 Nov 2010

© Can Altay
The Church Street Partners' Gazette, 2010, installation view
CAN ALTAY
"The Church Street Partners' Gazette"

13 October - 27 November 2010

For his first solo show in London, Can Altay has transformed The Showroom into the production site of a single edition newspaper: The Church Street Partners’ Gazette. The project draws on research and dialogues with a wide range of people connected to the local area, who Altay terms ‘partners’, and tries to expand the notion of partnership beyond its economic and juridical use.

The Gazette will be created through workshops such as one on headline writing, and discussion events at The Showroom under the headings of ‘Partnership’, ‘Boundaries’ and ‘Transformation’. Areas of investigation include rights to space, promises and threats related to regeneration, and limits presented by physical, social, political and economic boundaries.

The installation has two centres of activity: a meeting area, where the content of the paper is generated through open discussions and research; and a changing display of the Gazette incorporating large headlines, announcing the most recent fragments of the editorial, which are updated and reconfigured as copy is produced, accompanied by a photographic survey. The final version of the Gazette will go into print at the end of the show, offering its readers a study of the overlooked issues of local urban life.

Altay’s work is known for its focus on improvised architectures in the city, unauthorised systems of organisation and models of co-habitation. The Gazette continues his interest in ‘setting a setting’: a body of work where he proposes and constructs provisional spaces for gathering and production.

Can Altay (born Ankara, Turkey in 1975) has a PhD in Art, Design, and Architecture from Bilkent University (2004), an MFA and BFA from Bilkent University, and a degree in Critical Studies from Malmö Art Academy and Lund University, Sweden. He has had solo exhibitions in Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Germany (2008), Sala Rekalde, Spain (2006) and Spike Island, UK (2007) and has presented work at Istanbul, Havana and Gwangju biennials, as well as at the Walker Art Center (USA), Van Abbe Museum (The Netherlands), ZKM (Germany), PS1 MoMA (USA), and Platform Garanti (Turkey).

The Gazette is generously supported by Outset, Tansa Mermerci Eksioglu, Fusun Eczacibasi and Berna Tuglular, and is part of Circular Facts, funded with support from the European Commission.

Circular Facts is a collaborative endeavor between three European contemporary art organizations: Casco – Office for Art, Design and Theory, Utrecht, Objectif Exhibitions, Antwerp, The Showroom, London in partnership with Kunst Halle Sankt Gallen and Electric Palm Tree. It is financially supported by the Cooperation Measures Grant as part of the European Unions Culture 2007 programme.
 

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