Burcu Erden’s first solo exhibition at Art On İstanbul, Calling for the Mass, opens on April 26. Erden presents a dynamic series that distinguishes itself from her previous works shown in the Ashes of Tomorrow exhibition at Tophane-i Amire Cultural and Art Center last year, as well as her contributions to group exhibitions at Art On İstanbul. The artist’s new works, in which she transforms her understanding of the figure through her explorations of mark-making and abstraction, will be on view until May 31.
The exhibition, spread across three floors of the gallery, features sculptures and relief installations that approach monumentality with a sense of restraint. The works in Calling the Mass carry a wilder, more tense energy compared to Erden’s small-scale wooden human figure sculptures previously exhibited at Contemporary Istanbul fairs, which had drawn significant attention.
In this series, the figures are stripped of as many interpretive cues as possible. With no signs indicating the identity of the figure, reduced solely to the torso and without a head, these sculptures focus on abstract mass and form. In shaping her works through these reductions, Erden also frames her carving technique conceptually. By eliminating defined references and foregrounding the fundamental elements of sculptural discipline, Erden positions her sculptures outside specific temporal and spatial contexts.
Within the rapidly evolving grammar of her sculpture, the figure moves dynamically between convex and concave surfaces. The tension of convex surfaces is perceived first, giving the impression that the figure is about to make a move. Concave surfaces, meanwhile, create strong shadows that emphasize the mass while drawing the void inward.
Figures that seem to melt into sharply angled, massive columns support their mass from the base. The dynamism of the figure’s movement and the key decisions in its shaping offer clues to the dialogue the viewer may establish with the sculpture. In the crouching figures, the thoughtful posture of the body, despite the absence of the head, generates striking tension. The body, integrated with the mass, establishes a profound contrast between the dynamics of movement and the stability of the mass.
The missing head aligns with the viewer’s eye level, making the gaze plane of the sculpture appear to vanish with the absence of the face. The loss of the face also implies the loss of a frontal perspective. In this exhibition, viewers cannot easily distinguish front from back while observing the sculptures. Erden’s works are not fixed in a specific time or space, nor do they indicate a single, secure point from which to view them.