PORTRAITS

When does the age of wisdom begin for an artist? We can talk about various criteria in response to this. However, it will not be wrong to say that Ali Ra?it Karak?l?ç has opened the doors to a brand new and exciting era from a point of view of material, esthetic, structure, style whether it can be defined as the age of wisdom or as searching. In the “Dönü?üm / Transformation” exhibitions he would transfer the ‘moments’ he seized at the junkyards, second-hand shops to canvas and from the canvas to many other backdrops, cutting and slicing he would re-transfer them again and again and he created a brand new whole. While doing all this, it is possible to say that he kept his distance to what is coincidental, although he carried ‘ordinary’ moments to his works; that he arrived at the core with a deconstructive understanding. Yet, with these new works, Karak?l?ç shows that he has started to tell a brand new tale, and in order to tell his tale he is open to all deducted data. Karak?l?ç continues to find his inspiration for his new adventures in the junkyards he frequents. This is sometimes a frame that infiltrates through his retina, and sometimes a piece of junk thrown away thinking it has already completed its lifetime. However, his relationship with the coincidental is more candid and he does not hesitate to ‘invite it in’. Through such a clear mind perception, the air conditioning radiators, the fundamental material of his new works, appear at Karak?l?ç’s present era. We stand before an exhibition that winks at the icon of the mother goddess cult of Anatolia, the story of Göbeklitepe covered with secrets and magnificence. The artist does not even for an instant deny the own language, story of the material in the details, waiting to be noticed in his new works with different forms. On the contrary, he unites this language with his own, strengthening his style and expression and does not hesitate to share this with his audience. The artist, without excluding the state of mind of this world, with persistence, hope; processes the images, emotions all that are witnesses to these and the whispers around those images, to the junk air conditioning radiators. He curls, bends, twists the thin as wafer plates, calculating the touch of light. He re-describes life with these bends. He contributes to the plurality of meaning in the world with the most personal, most intimate, most self-sacrificing touches. There is an artisan side to these works, together with the masterful understanding of design and knowledge of light. The artist knows his material and ‘listens’ to it. He examines the daily life around him closely, and then he uses what he sees as a material for allegory and mythos. The extraordinary material he has chosen does not only contribute to the artist’s language with its form, its real function silently sneaks into the language of art, form and essence. The different emotions of the portraits the artist portrays and the indescribable energy in them, ‘cools off’ going through the channels. The shapes that witness to his present period are prisoners behind iron bars at a glance, and at another glance, stands up next to the viewer, having left the bars behind. Etymologically, ‘portrait’ means to ‘re-produce’. In the artist’s words “a vast surface where the past, life experience and memories are gathered”. Looking from here, the soul-mapped works of Karak?l?ç is where it should, when it should be, exactly as it should be. These questions await the viewer: Which portrait are you hidden in, prisoner in which whisper? Alternatively, did you start to track the signs of the future, having sent everything you know to the infinite cycle of the spiral? The products of this ‘young’ mind are extraordinary, exciting… Zeynep ?anl?er Tansu?, December-2015