The Wall That Went for a Walk
REHAN MISKCI • NATALIA NAKAZAWA
OCTOBER 19 –NOVEMBER 18, 2018
OPENING RECEPTION FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19, 6–9pm
Event with the artists: WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2018, 7pm
Transmitter is pleased to present The Wall That Went for a Walk, featuring work by Rehan Miskci and Natalia Nakazawa. Taking its title from an Andy Goldsworthy sculpture, this exhibition explores the movement of metaphorical boundaries and physical borders, as well as the breaking of the fourth wall.
Miskci and Nakazawa are both engaged with their personal histories and multi-cultural identities as Armenian-Turkish and Japanese-Uruguayan artists respectively. Their work considers personal and historical memory, the migration and displacement of people, the transgression of borders, and the creation of artificial environments. They challenge rigid bureaucratic structures and systems of power as a way to recollect traces of the under-represented.
In Rehan Miskci’s ongoing project, Foto Yeraz, she examines the traditional photographic studio in connection to her Armenian identity and the cultural erasure of preceding generations. At the heart of the project is an empty and fictitious photography studio, absent of people, where the spatial elements: backdrops, props, and elaborate sets, step in and become the subjects. Using archival imagery and digitally rendered environments, Miskci juxtaposes fragments of former studio subjects with a mix of real and imaginary components of the studio environment. Interested in the breakdown between the two- and three-dimensional, her works allow the viewer to envision how the complete studio space would appear. Visitors are encouraged to interact with the large studio backdrop in order to consider the relevance of studio photography at a time when everyone is a photographer and every place is a backdrop.
Natalia Nakazawa’s work is concerned with identity, multiculturalism, storytelling, archives, and patterns of migration. She has long been fascinated by comprehensive cultural institutions like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but has questioned her own place and personal history within their confines. Nakazawa accumulates archival imagery by entering poetic search terms into the museum's database, collapsing layered representations of the collection into textiles in order to reconsider the museum’s alienating structures. In her wood panel paintings, she uses Jacquard woven ribbons that have been arranged as orthographic architectural forms to present multiple perspectives. Influenced by eastern storytelling devices and illustrated manuscripts, the works seek to present numerous viewpoints of a singular story.
Rehan Miskci (b. 1986, Istanbul) is a New York and Istanbul based visual artist working in photography, video, and installation. She holds an undergraduate degree in Interior Architecture from Istanbul Technical University and an MFA in Photography, Video and Related Media from the School of Visual Arts, New York. Her photographic series “Void” was selected as the first place winner at Baxter Street Camera Club of New York’s Annual Competition in 2015, and was exhibited in Lift Off at Fridman Gallery, curated by Elisabeth Biondi. She has participated in exhibitions in New York, Los Angeles, Munich, Beirut, and Istanbul.
Natalia Nakazawa received her MFA in studio practice from California College of the Arts, a MSEd from Queens College, and a BFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design. Her work has been exhibited at The Children’s Museum of Manhattan, The Museum of Arts and Design, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Space for Public Art, SELECT Miami Art Fair, Blackburn 20|20 Gallery, ISE Cultural Foundation, Old Stone House, Queens Museum of Art, Topaz Arts Inc., Wassaic Project, The Noyes Museum of Art, Project for Empty Space, and Casa de la Ciudad, Oaxaca, México.