N E Z I R    K O R K M A Z
 
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     What draws the artist’s attention most is the confrontation between 15th century Italian art and German Gothic, more than the mix of styles of which mannerism is made. Here the painting of Nezir attains voluptuousness. It is interesting to see how Nezir succeeds in amalgamating fabulous traditional themes with the tastes of today; a splash of surrealism, echoes of German Fachlighkeit (OTTO DIX in particular) and a big helping of magic surrealism and the delicious inventions of science fiction. Some audacious perspectives, fragmented in elongated and forced viewpoints, certain naturalistic obsessions, and above all the mix of old and new (e.g. ; the human and the mechanical) make this painting fascinating. These same deformations become a game, not so much of formalism, but of an expressive element with deep psychological implications. Imbalance and incongruity are naturally a part of the scene. A poignant symbolic quintessence is attained with the images turned against themselves with all the tubes and filaments and mechanical insertions in the body.
     Painting such as this with its anachronism and classical references is very surprising in today’s art scene. We are in the presence of a past so strong that it produces strange forward movements; we have trouble discerning what belongs to history and what echoes fantasy. Nezir moves in ambiguous ground, were the very risky means spell out a spirit of challenge and adventure. Given the cultural context, this is perfectly plausible. It is interesting to note how this challenge is carried forward, a visceral pleasure to admire the ability of a painter with the patience of a medieval miniaturist.
    A Turk from Kurdistan comes to exhibit in Venice, a city still imbued with an oriental memory, to unlock a world (that of the gothic German, modeled by the renaissance spirit of Dürer) which seems frozen in its gilded molding.   ....History can be delivered to us in fantasy. The tubes that protrude from the woman’s body are the symptoms of this improbable result.