Manuel Çıtak - islomania
12 Mayıs-2 Temmuz, Depo, İstanbul
Küratörler: Refik Akyüz, Serdar Darendeliler
'islomania' takes its title from “island intoxication,” a rare but not unknown condition first described by the writer Lawrence Durrell in his 1953 book Reflections on a Marine Venus. The exhibition brought together a new body of work by Manuel Çıtak, focusing on the relationship between people, nature, and the sea.
Among Çıtak’s best-known and most widely circulated works are his photographs exploring the relationship between people and the sea. In many of his early photographs on this subject, made in different locations during the 1990s, particularly around the Mediterranean, a sense of tranquillity, languor, suspended time, and solitude predominates. In his photographs of Kilyos on the Black Sea coast, dating from the early 2000s, by contrast, vast crowds take centre stage. With 'islomania', Çıtak takes the relationship between people and the sea—and the experience of being alone with oneself—in a different direction, developing a new visual language both formally and conceptually. Colour, rarely seen in his earlier work and used here to emphasise the experience of being immersed in nature, together with expansive panoramic views, adds new dimensions and layers to the photographs. Lives removed from everything else, simple yet striking landscapes, the experience of being fully immersed in nature, and the act of surrendering oneself to its tranquillity permeate every photograph in the series, whether it depicts vast, uninhabited landscapes or people merging with their surroundings.
Known primarily for the black-and-white documentary photographs he had produced throughout his career, Çıtak described the images in islomania as follows: “The images, in a sense, reveal purification, escape, withdrawal, isolation, and separation from the whole. And there, as part of the experience, I am in the same state of mind—almost as though I were the subject of what you see and what I see.” With these words, Çıtak emphasised that he was no longer merely an observer, but was reflecting an emotional state that he himself shared. islomania also differs from his earlier series in that the photographs are not spontaneous, but incorporate a deliberate element of construction.
Çıtak passed away shortly after the exhibition. islomania therefore remains the only solo exhibition presented during his lifetime.
Click here to download the exhibition brochure for 'islomania' as a PDF.
