To those who have no time to play
14 Oct – 22 Jan 2023
EXHIBITION OPENING
13 October, 19:00
ARTIST
Gluklya (Natalia Pershina-Yakimanskaya)
IN COLLABORATION WITH
Moawya Alkhadra
BiSCA (Saadat Aitalieva)
Shepherd Camara
Roger Cremers
Liah Frank
Natalia Grezina
Marianne Koeman
Vladimir Rannev
Benjamin Roth
Gulmira Tursunbaeva
Anna Bitkina
Shaiymkan Chylgobaeva
Kunduz Asanakunova
Anisa Ibrayeva
Nurlan Alymseitov
Dinara Akylova
Rahat Bolotbek kyzy
Zayna Ayazbekova
Open Line Foundation
CURATOR
Charles Esche
Framer Framed presents To those who have no time to play, the largest solo exhibition for the Amsterdam-based artist Gluklya (Natalia Pershina-Yakimanskaya), curated by Charles Esche. In keeping with her previous work, the exhibition involves many collaborators from Kyrgyz textile workers and recent migrants to the Netherlands to musicians and writers.
The exhibition is structured around four elements, each with its own unique architecture. These are two yurts, a dome, and a stage on which there will be occasional live performances. The works take us from Amsterdam to Bishkek, and via St. Petersburg back to Amsterdam again.
Although conditions in Bishkek or St. Petersburg might seem far from Dutch society, bringing these different social and emotional geographies together through art emphasises connections between them. It is impossible to ignore the many disasters looming on the horizon: the climate crisis, extreme social inequality, the war in Ukraine and the harsh working lives of people supplying cheap goods to Western high streets. Gluklya relates it all in a surreal landscape, where humour appears unexpectedly. She takes us on an associative journey through global abuses, whether they be forced labour and migration, economic exploitation or abuse of power.
CONTACT
SUPPORTED BY
Ministerie van Onderwijs, Cultuur en Wetenschap; Gemeente Amsterdam; AFK; Stichting DOEN; Van Abbemuseum
ADDRESS
Oranje-Vrijstaatkade 71,
1093 KS Amsterdam
OPENING TIMES
Tue – Sun (12:00 – 18:00)
Free Entree
The book “Two Diaries”
This book emerged as a collaboration with Kurdish activist Murad Zorava, who started to write during this project and I hope he might continue.
In 2017, I was renting a studio in one of the two towers of Bijlmerbajes, a former prison in Amsterdam-Zuid-Oost. The second tower was then used by the government as an Asylum-Seekers-Center (AZC). My plan was to attempt a collaboration with the refugees staying there at the time, among whom was Murad.
During my project in Bijlmerbajes, I was confronted with eye-opening questions: What does equality mean, when it is equality between a refugee and an artist, between – so to speak –trained artists and the person who did not study art at all? Can we imagine rethinking and abandoning the idea of enlightenment? How to deal with the notion of Care without falling into patronization, but soberly staying within the frame of Radical Care?
At the start of my research, I visited AZC meetings. These were some of the regular lessons provided to the refugees to teach them about the social structure of the Netherlands and what they could expect here. Nothing was said during those meetings about culture and art, let alone contemporary art. This was surprising to me. It felt as if these people were held not equal to us, westerners, as many westerners believe they cannot survive without a breath of cultural or artistic air. Another thing that struck me was the fact of placing people in the environment of a prison: bars on windows, no locks from inside the rooms, no actual privacy, and unpleasant communal places.
Being haunted by this image of Murad in the cell of the former prison, I started to think about what exactly I could do in this situation. During one of the workshops, I proposed participants write a diary, and Murad accepted this idea. I am very happy to hope that the project had a practical outcome in reality. Murad believes that work with the publishing of his Diary helped him to settle down in Amsterdam.
The book can be purchased here https://www.buchhandlung-walther-koenig.de/koenig2/index.php?mode=details&showcase=1&art=1638030