INTERVIEW WITH NEZAKET EKİCİ

I enjoyed your performance at the Marina Abramovic exhibition, which opened its doors in Sakıp Sabancı Museum. Especially its progress in an interactive form with the audience makes the performance quite effective. Could you tell us a little about the preparation process of the performance which was framed by mind mapping concept?

The performance ” Work in Progress – Personal map…” has been around since 2008 when I first performed it in 10th Asiatopia International Performance Festival, Bangkok.  I performed in some other places Stuttgart (Gedok 2009), Sabadell (Performancefestival Ebent 2009) , Curitiba (5th Latin-American Biennal of Visual Arts, Vento Sul, Curitiba 2009) Karlsruhe (ZKM 2011/12) , Innsbruck (Tiroler Landesmuseum2017)

In the performance  I use nails, red robe and hammer and  spin my personal Map my worldmap of my artistic works. Before the performance has begann I wrote all my Body with Tattoo Pen and Edding  (paint marker) with my ART  biography because I can’t remember everything I did in the past 20 years of my professional artwork. I produced more es 250 different Performances , I performed live in more than 170 cities, 60 countries and on 4 continents. My skin and my body become a kind of leaf and it takes up to 15 hours to write everything on the body. Of course I also have to remember the world map to be able to orientate myself fundamentally.

But it also depends on the guests/public  and what they know about the world, because I ask as well the audience for help to find the countries and places.

This performance is  interactive and works with the public . Beside helping by the  map , they performe with me fragments of my performances and hear stories of my performances. The public at Sakip Sabanci Museum was amazing. They love to interact , the loved to help me by my map , they love to performe fragments of my performances , they loved to hear stories of my performances.

The performance is a work in progress, in which I currently at Sakip Sabanci Museum, tell about 400 performance events including repetitions. This is, so to speak, my oral art biography and at the same time an oral retrospective of all my artworks . The performance took 10 days 8 hours each day in total 80 hours.

Because the Tattoo on my body gets quickly out , instead to write every day the hole biography again again each day 15 hours , I decide to write once and not wash my body for 10 days. After the Performance I went on 11 day to a Hamam and. Got from Hamam Women a Kese and Köpük and filmed this process with my camera team a produced new Videoperformance piece.

Marina Abramovic exhibition is a very important project and it is a great honor for us to see your name involved in this project. How did the process work for you, how did you come together, can you share what you did during the mental production process?

I studied 4 years from 200-2004 by Marina Abramovic performance art HBK Braunschweig.

MAI invited me first for live performances , but I allready worked with MAI they present my performance Videos in some other locations in the world before The Marina Abramivic Institute (MAI) , the curator Paula Garcia and Serge Lê Borgne , invited me along with tree  other international artists and they insisted that I do my performance for the opening.

The other artists applied to MAI by open call.  More es 400 applications and they choose 12 Artists. At the same time  MAI , the curator Billy Zhao invited me to present two videos of me (Hullabelly 2002, Cash Machine 2016) at Akbanksanat in a screen Programm among other videos will be show till 22.2.2020. In soon from 25.2. -8.3.2020 I will present two more videos .

In preparation for the Performances in the Museum, the invited and selected Artist did a Workshop “Cleaning the house. Of Marina Abramovic in Sakarya. For 5 days  of fasting , no talking , and concentration exercises and meditations are done.

I have done such workshops together with Marina Abramovic as I was student, once in Santiago de Compostella in 2002 and 2004 in Cadiz. This time the workshop took place without Marina Abramovic under the direction of MAI., workshop leader Lynsey Peisinger and Billy Zhao.

Performance art is a discipline that requires intensive preparation both mentally and physically. What do you pay attention to when constructing your performances conceptually and physically and how are you prepared?

Normally I have a very clear picture of my performance ideas and develop a concept for them. I can’t do any work that doesn’t embody a meaning for me and a statement.  It has always a concept each performance. Conceptual Art .

Just to be clear: I still want everyone to see in my work what they see in it. I don’t want the audience to see what I see. I don’t really prepare myself for my performances. For some years now, because I get older (49 years I am know) I have been doing regular and targeted sport to keep myself physically fit. As a matter of principle, I don’t do any exercise for a new performance: it shall always be authentially and even if I repeat a performance, it’s usually like a new performance for me, because the place is different, the people are different , and also the atmosphere in the room is different as well the material is not the same . My performance “Work in. progress – Personal map…” in the Sakip Sabanci Museum is also different and new, because for the first time I do it for 8 hours every day and  for 10 days. In total 80 hours.

There are some topics always discussed about collecting; details such as the storage, purchase and importance of the performance art. In order to inform our readers; can you give us information about the permanence of performance art and the sustainability of idea as an art object?

Performance art is momentary. It is therefore difficult to capture it, because it is gone with the passing moment. But I have studied visual art, sculpture and painting , my goal is always to leave objects and relics behind. A performance must always produce something new. With a performance I always create a new work of art with its own right. This is a creative process, where art is created within the artwork. I also sell performance photos, videos and sculptures and relics of my work.

What is important for an artist is never to stand still and create something new again and again.


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