YARAT RESIDENTS: ON THE TIP OF OTHER TONGUES GROUP EXHIBITION

YARAT Contemporary Art Space is pleased to announce the group exhibition “On the tip of other tongues” with works by YARAT residents Agil Abdullayev (AZ), Laura Bianco (Italy), Mandy Merzaban (Canada), Aydan Mirzayeva (AZ)

On the tip of other tongues, a group exhibition of YARAT’s current artists in residence brings together a series of works that intimate scenes of dialogue. Through varying approaches to installation and video, the artists create moments of correspondence between objects, landscapes and narratives through fictionalised encounters. The exhibition draws loosely on Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin and his seminal theories on language, where he proposes how the word can be regarded as a nexus of voices and a matrix of interactions. In his seminal text Problems of “Dostoevsky's Poetics” (1963), he mentions how one lives in a world of other’s words; frequently referring to the intertextuality of expression and the inherent otherness of utterance. The notion of realms and histories hidden in the usage of words offers a vantage point from which to reflect on the ways the artists explore the re-sequencing of language, both visual and linguistic, to enact this dialogic reality.

Agil Abdullayev’s site-specific installation "I said, we are going to the moon and we even didn't make it to the roof" questions the certainty of existing conditions and situations of the social and religious structures within existing taboos. Two video works are installed face-to-face in the half green painted space, juxtaposing the artist positions himself as a narrator and the act of the washing procedure to be prepared for praying, in the middle the photograph "Rashida is the roof" is displayed. The installation refers mainly to the critical problems of social and cultural reality in which the artist offers his opinion on the relationship between religion and science. Looking superficially the work plays with contrasts; however, at a deeper level of observation, the artist manages to create dialogues between seemingly incompatible, different worlds. In a poetic and subtle way, he forms a fictive narrative, questioning the validity of dogmas, the word, and a dualistic understanding of the world. The washing scene seems to convey the key, as this ritual applies to the spiritual intuition and the inner purification through water, that stands for moving, changing and acceptance of diversity.

Laura Bianco’s four-channel video installation In Visible Cities takes inspiration from Italo Calvino’s novel “Invisible Cities” (1972). Defined by the author as a “polyhedron shaped book”, it comprises descriptions of fictional cities divided into thematic groups and feature moments of dialogue between the explorer Marco Polo and the emperor Kublai Khan. The work aims to experiment with the novel’s narrative structure to draw an indirect portrait of Baku. As a polyhedric kosmos, it only exists as a juxtaposition of fragments of different fictional cities. For Calvino, the symbol of the city expresses “the tension between geometric rationality and the tangle of human existences”. With this in mind, the artist draws on the Zoroastrian tradition of the four basic elements (earth, water, air, fire), which could be considered as one of the first attempts to identify a precise - almost “geometric” – structure behind the tangled complexity of nature. Considering the four elemental system of classification and Calvino’s thematic one, she creates her own one, pairing the different elements with corresponding themes (body, memory, sign and desire). Each city is then the result of the combination of an element and a theme. By playing in between documentarist approaches and fictional storytelling, each one depict something of Baku.

Mandy Merzaban’s installation “Littoral intimacies” is a series of projected, vertical diptychs of natural and urban spaces that appear as brief, quiet vignettes of scenes in discourse. Drawn from collected personal encounters, imparted stories and historical minutiae, the paired scenes play out as encounters between parallel worlds. Their virtual relationships intimate subtle tensions that arise from their spatial, political or economic associations. Among these dual scenes, include of fog lifting from a low peak of the Greater Caucasus mountains as waves from the Caspian sea endlessly retreat in a reverse primordial movement. In another scene luminous, insoluble, oil bubbles rise spontaneously from calm waters, while clouds occlude the sun in a re-formulation of the four elements (water/air | oil/sun). A waning river changes direction against the movement of a 1930 Bibi Heybat oil donkey; an inverted suspended river drains from a regrowing greenhouse, while another scene shows passersby taking selfies along the Caspian above the Soviet oil rigs of Shikov beach.

In her work “Twins” Aydan Mirzayeva continues her series highlighting the structure and fascinating particularities of wood. As her earlier pieces, it is based on the most recent scientific knowledge that trees can register pain, learn things, and even protect and care for each other through a root network that enables to communicate with each other. Using different colours following the delicate wooden patters the artist furthermore explores the beauty of a complex system investigating transient objects exposed to weather and growth and making visible aesthetics of dynamics and processes in nature. In the current version of their series, the wooden panels are hung directly opposite, highlighting the hidden, communicative aspect of the material.

About artists 

Agil Abdullayev, (b. 1992, Azerbaijan) primarily working in moving image, photography and performance graduated from BA Fine Arts with First Class Hounour at Nottingham Trent University (2018), has been selected for Blooberg New Contemporaries (2018), being recipient of “Attic Residency” by One Thorsby Street in Nottingham, UK. His multidisciplinary practice examines the Caucasian identity aiming to facilitate a dialogue of identity and society with the contrast of the subjects such as femininity and masculinity, public life and private life, western and eastern cultural standards and bridging the spaces between these subjects.

Laura Bianco (b. 1990, Italy) is an Italian filmmaker, film editor and visual artist. After a BA (Hons) in Media Design and Multimedia Arts at NABA (New Academy of Fine Arts) in Milano, she started working mostly at the intersection of documentary, experimental films and animation. Her films have been screened in film festivals, art galleries and cultural events in Italy and abroad.

Mandy Merzaban (b. 1987, Canada) is an artist and a curator of modern and contemporary art with a focus on Arab modernism. Her research based practice looks at affect, memory and language through moving image, text and printmaking. She is a graduate of Fine Arts and Anthropology from the University of British Columbia and an upcoming Masters student at MIT Architecture (2019-2021).

Aydan Mirzayeva (b. 1992, Azerbaijan) graduated from the Azerbaijan Academy of Fine Arts in Industrial Design (2010-2014). She participated successfully in the ARTIM LAB project 2017/2018 and was granted with a residency at YARAT Studios. In 2018, she participated in the Art Prospect Residency Program in Kiev (Ukraine). Her work has been featured in Azerbaijan, UAE and Ukraine. Her most recent work explores aesthetics of hidden dynamics and processes of wood material. 

YARAT Residency Program 

YARAT Contemporary Art Space invites artists to apply for the residency programme of end every year (september). The programme is divided into three periods (January-April, April-July and September-December) and grants selected artists an opportunity to live and work in Baku for up to three months. Each period hosts two international and two local residents.

YARAT Residency Programme is open for artists who are engaged in open, research-based practice across disciplines and show an interest in discovering the Caucasus region. The programme engages residents in discussions with fellow artists and international arts professionals, as well as travel around Azerbaijan. Artworks resulting from the residence are exhibited at the ARTIM Project Space, Baku. YARAT Residency programme is predominantly conducted in English.

Opening date: 18 April 2019

Time: 7 pm

Exhibition dates: 18 April – 10 May 2019

Working hours: Tuesday – Sunday, 12 pm – 8 pm

Address: ARTIM Project Space, Old City (Icherisheher), Boyuk Gala Street 30, 001A 

Admission is free