The Roving Eye

Last weekend, the boy, our roommate and I roamed out to Taksim, a district that is often referred to as the heart of modern Istanbul. We were strolling along İstiklal Avenue (the equivalent of Chicago's Magnificent Mile or London's Oxford street) when we came across an art exhibition named The Roving Eye, a collection of pieces by contemporary artists across Southeast Asia.

It all began with the donut-like ping pong table, which immediately caught our eye through the glass as we were walking by...

Curiosities thoroughly piqued, we wandered in, unsure of what we were getting ourselves into.

One of these is not like the other.

Some pieces like this one seemed whimsical at first but on closer inspection, carried heavy political undertones.

It became obvious very quickly that this was no ordinary museum. Many of the exhibits encouraged or even required their audience to interact with the art.

Listening to traditional Southeast Asian music.

Making some music of our own.

???

Hats in the styles of various monarchs, all made of scrap metal.

Playing dress up.

One particularly interesting piece was set up in such a way that the viewer is invited into a small area with ordinary furnishings and a mirror on the wall. You walk in, survey the things around you, wonder what's so special about this area, and take a quick glance into the mirror on your way out - only to see nobody there, or worse, a different person entirely! Because there is no mirror after all, just two identical, very cleverly set up spaces. Really alarming stuff.

Another really memorable exhibit was one in which high-def cameras mounted on the ceiling were pointed at records on a table. The view from the camera was then projected on the wall so as a participant, you could see your hands as you disc jockey'ed. In the picture below you can see on the left what both projections looked like (before I stuck my mug into the right one):

I managed to convince the boy to join me for what I think turned out to be an interesting photo. The pose was tricky and required performing a bridge-like move, arching our our backs back so that our faces could fit into the small frame of the lens.

At one point a museum docent approached us and I was sure he was going to give us a stern talking to for laying our heads down on the records... but he was so amused that he actually helped the boy bend back further. He also requested to see the photos afterwards, to which we happily obliged.

We spent almost two hours in the museum before wandering back out. It was getting dark already, so we weaved downhill through stores and restaurants until we reached the Galata Tower.

Along the way, we picked up a funny little souvenir.

Best 5 turkish lira I've ever spent.

We concluded our evening with a meal back in our part of town, Mecidiyeköy. I went for a traditional kebab dinner with a healthy serving of kuru fasulye, a Turkish bean stew that is addictingly good. A delicious end to a fun day out.