Derya Kazan

Stone Letters

September 5 - October 25, 2019

Pg Basement is pleased to host young artist Derya Kazan’s project “Stone Letters” between 5 September and 25 October.

There exist sentences of thousands of years waiting to be read in the gaps of a building, in the walkway of a garden, in the steps of stairs, in the world we walk over which have broken away or have been torn apart from a whole. These parts which carry the sentences may be said to be witnesses of almost all of the history of humanity. Stones record the physical conditions of the environment they emerge from, but they also enable us to read the past with the biological remains they carry up to the present.

In "Stone Letters” project, Kazan creates a temporal fiction. In this fiction, the eclecticist identity of the stones bring a thought into existence about contacting the future. Stones propose the possibility of bringing the present into the future, just like the past civilizations which have broken their temporary natures with written stones and stone structures. Actually, remains to be carried from the present to the future are thought to be enduring objects. For example, mobile phones made of alloys, gold and rare metals are enduring objects found in the world. Stone letters project focuses on the parts which do not endure in nature for a long time. Stones, in this sense, will hide within themselves the traces of fragile and temporary parts of today’s living. Project takes its name from a letter cliché: “When you are reading these lines, I will be far away.”