Time-Based

Overview

Istanbul, Turkey

2009

We had just been to the markets and purchased hundreds of tiny gold safety pins day before. We were sitting around a table discussing and planning the exhibition, there was always someone translating between Turkish and English. Then, someone began to assemble the safety pins into chains. At some point everyone, from the gallery assistant, to the artist who had the previous exhibition and was waiting for a truck to pick up his paintings, began doing the same action. 100s of safety pins were methodically attached into long chains. No one asked why, we all understood that regardless of the barriers that separated us it was possible to develop ways of communicating where language wasn’t necessary.