Beneath the Same Blue

Istanbul Modern’s 10th collection exhibition brings together works by artists from Türkiye and different parts of the world, produced across various periods and geographies, along historical and thematic axes. Spanning the museum’s permanent exhibition gallery and different floors of the museum, the exhibition traces the transformation of modern and contemporary art in Türkiye since the 1940s, while offering new ways of reading the collection through encounters and dialogues established with works by international artists, particularly from the 2000s onward.

The exhibition takes its title from a color that connects various times, and experiences. “Beneath the Same Blue” approaches blue as both a color and a backdrop that evokes seas, horizons, dreams, freedom, distances, and affinities. Bringing together works produced in different periods and contexts, the first section of the exhibition focuses on the development of modern and contemporary art in Türkiye from the 1940s to the 2000s. Structured around a historical trajectory, this section begins with the early examples of abstract art and extends to diverse forms of figurative expression, changing aesthetic approaches, and the social and artistic questions that come to the fore in artists’ practices.

The second section presents a selection of works produced after 2000 under thematic headings. Bringing together artists from across generations and geographies under the same roof, the selection makes visible the changing forms of artistic expression and the plurality of perspectives on today’s world. Through media such as painting, video, photography, sculpture, and installation, the exhibition addresses contemporary questions including abstraction, figure and body, identity, city and space, migration, war, memory, and nature. Each section invites viewers to move through layers of art history and contemporary art through selections that focus on the aesthetic and intellectual atmosphere of a particular period.

“Beneath the Same Blue” considers the works in the collection within the artistic tendencies of the periods in which they were produced, while also opening Türkiye’s changing social, cultural, and political climate to reflection in dialogue with international artistic practices. The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue featuring comprehensive illustrations and texts on the artists and artworks, along with essays by Istanbul Modern Artistic Director Çelenk Bafra, “Expanding Horizon of the Museum: The Collection,” Curator Deniz Pehlivaner, “Beneath the Same Blue,” and İstanbul Modern Collection Advisory Board member Prof. Dr. Esra Aliçavuşoğlu, “Rethinking the Collection: On Time, Knowledge, and Representation,” all of which further deepen the exhibition’s conceptual framework.

Exhibition Curators: Çelenk Bafra, Deniz Pehlivaner
Assistant Curator: Naz Uğurlu Benek, Exhibition Producer: Selen Erkal

Image:
Âbidin Elderoğlu, 1901-1974
Composition, 1969 (detail)
Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı Foundation Collection
Istanbul Museum of Modern Art / Long term loan