A new solo exhibition by Murat Morova “Nature-Morte” opens at Galeri Nev İstanbul on 14th of February. Exhibition can be seen until 29th of March. Morova questions our relationship with nature and death today through a multi-layered structure. As Morova reminds us that the human damage to the balance of nature furthers irreversibly, he invites the audience to roam among aesthetic premises and political statements in the purgatory between destructiveness of death and the desire to reclaim life.
One of the main points of departure for the works in the exhibition is environmental pollution, which is still considered within the domain of micro-politics and placed in secondary political agendas. Morova’s new world atlas: a composition of industrial waste and figurines of endangered animals signpost a grim future. Resembling Art Nouveau statuettes these new continents call attention to our responsibility in shaping the future of earth; in other words our own future. This new world polluted and tarnished with fossil fuels and turned into hell for all the living except humans seem familiar when we consider artificial macro political agendas and the power games built upon environmental issues. The promised paradise offers a garden decorated with dried flowers rather than the hope for finding what has been lost.
Like in his previous works, Morova’s pieces made of ready-made materials are molded of the aesthetic and conceptual dialogue he weaves between East and West. Morova formulates his methods to arrange figure, stain and object with reference to hierarchical perspective in miniatures and the Ottoman tradition of Kat’ı: paper cutting. Compositions of animal like figures and stains in Morova’s tar drawings evoke hunting scenes in Ottoman miniatures. Ambiguity and transitivity of forms opens the premises of the exhibition about future as a matter of interpretation to the audience. The installation Morova composed with various objects in his studio refers the bouquets of dehydrated flowers sent from the Holy Land (Arz-ı Mukaddes) during Abdulhamid II’s accession to the throne; adding a new layer to artist’s critique of macro politics in Turkey today.
Morova’s “Nature-Morte” exhibition can be considered as a new phase of his interest in reconsidering classical representation in Western painting with cross cultural comparisons, possibilities of different materials and his inquiries of form. Focusing on the figure in “Ah Min’el, Aşk-ı Memnu” and landscape in “Menazır-ı Mensiye” series for his aesthetic probes, Morova takes still life as a concept and positions in a debate of politics and culture. The broken axle of the rusty metal globe in the exhibition points to the necessity of a new balance.
