For visitors to İstanbul, and even many city residents, the local art scene is a foreign world. But there are no guidebooks to this world, no maps, and no experts to lead you by the hand. Without these resources, the smallest problems can turn into insurmountable difficulties.
‘Artist Information’
Until now. PiST, a non-profit artists' initiative that opened in İstanbul's Pangaltı neighborhood in May of 2006, aims to counter the lack of information about contemporary art in İstanbul with its current project, "Artist Information." Open for visits through August, the sleekly designed installation takes on the familiar profile of information booths scattered throughout city squares, airports, and tourist attractions worldwide. A smiling person waits behind a desk (replete with a cheery "i" logo in bright blue), ready to answer your questions. But few visitors to "Artist Information" ask about train schedules -- unless they need one for art purposes. Rather they want to know: Where can I rent a 16 millimeter camera in İstanbul? How many contemporary art collectors are there in the city? What does the term "ethnic" mean, and how does it function within contemporary art in Turkey?
PiST, an art project in itself
For PiST founders Didem Özbek and Osman Bozkurt, the project is not just a job that has taken over their lives: "It is my life," says Özbek. Such is the nature of an artists' initiative. Though in some respects it resembles one -- inviting artists to perform and display work -- PiST is not a gallery. "It is an art project in itself," Özbek continues. "We're not curators." At any given time, PiST has served as a social venue, a place for discussion between local and visiting artists, and an outlet for publications. Pangaltı is only slightly removed (by one metro stop) from Taksim, where many of the city's arts venues cluster. But with the nearby Ramada hotel as the most significant draw in this area devoid of other tourist attractions, PiST is a unique phenomenon. "We've never seen anything like this," notes a local tea seller. For Özbek and Bozkurt, who both lived just around the corner for several years before opening PiST, the decision to establish the art space sprang out of their own personal relationship with the neighborhood. In part, they acted out of frustration. All around them other residents were asserting their presence in the public space -- shouting for tea, regulating parking and arguing in the street. Appropriating three neighboring store fronts (formerly an electrical hardware store, a restaurant and a grocery store), the pair made room for their own art interests amongst the local shops and bars.
In the past the art center has sought to engage directly with its 24-7 neighborhood by offering up a 24-7 viewing experience: one project catered to the late-night hours of the neighborhood's club- and bar-goers by screening films between midnight and the early hours of the morning. PiST/// 7-24, a changing display window that faces out onto the street, garners the most approbation in the immediate community. "People like the display window," says one shopkeeper. "They come and look with curiosity at the new pictures." Currently the display showcases a "map" of İstanbul's art community, in continuation of the "tourist program" of "Artist Information." In an intricate network of black and red lines, Finnish artist Minna L. Henrikkson traces the criss-crossing relationships that unite artists, curators, and others as friends, colleagues, or acquaintances of a more ambiguous nature. As a further extension of the project, PiST plans to schedule tours (artist-led walks in the city), and put out a calendar of local art events in September, entitled LiST. Many locals emphasize that they don't quite understand what the art center is. The tea man across the street has hung up a PiST flyer on his wall because he likes the images, but confesses he has no idea what it is for. In large part, locals' hesitation to find out more stems from their impression that PiST is a forum for foreigners. Residents' assertions that they "don't understand" what goes on at PiST is a response to the language spoken by visitors, rather than an expression of unfamiliarity with film or photography. In fact many suggest that what they enjoy most about PiST are the displays that allow them to participate without being excluded by language differences: although the films are often in foreign languages, notes the tea seller, he can still follow the stories on the screen. Özbek notes, "If we can catch a broader Turkish audience, the isolation [of locals] will be gone." If most locals respond with confused affability, there is also the occasional prank. An unopened package of cookies was thrown from a nearby rooftop into the crowd at a recent PiST book launch. Was this a demonstration of hostility, or hospitality? Nobody was entirely sure.
An eccentric neighbor
PiST is an acknowledged presence on Pangaltı Dere Street, but one which inspires covert observation more than direct interaction. Shopkeepers and residents watch goings-on at the art center in much the same way one might spy on an eccentric neighbor: with varying degrees of curiosity, but little desire to make contact unless inspired or provoked. It is not clear whether locals' reserved attitude is specifically a response to PiST's ambiguous status -- or if such a response indicates that PiST successfully fits into an existing way of life, where "live and let live" is the neighborhood's established code. After all, not all of the shops in the neighborhood feel the need to announce themselves as something specific. Some are simply there, like a local repairman, whose store full of wood serves in place of a sign specifying exactly what he does. For Bülent Sancak, a neighborhood resident who trained as an architect, this very ambiguity is an indication of PiST's success. "Even though many people thought PiST was many different things," says Sancak, "it has succeeded in making people ask, 'What is this? What is it trying to do? What is it trying to say?' And that is what art is supposed to do."
There are no experts
Overlaying the tourism sector's design techniques with material drawn from the arts community, the current "Artist Information" installation is two things at once: both a useful tool for visitors and members of İstanbul's art scene, and a tongue-in-cheek imitation of the art and tourism worlds' claims to expert knowledge. PiST plans to compile a list of the questions that have been asked at the "information desk" in Pangaltı, and publish them along with their answers. In some cases, PiST will call in "experts" to give responses -- big names in the art world, people whose professional pursuits match up exactly with the questions asked. But rather than supplying a single, "correct" answer to each inquiry, PiST will include a range of responses, provided by a number of different individuals. By giving equal weight to a spectrum of responses, "Artist Information" capitalizes on its independent status to suggest something that neither the tourism industry nor art institutions will ever themselves emphasize: maybe there are no real "experts" for the bewildered tourist to depend on for the correct answer. Maybe everybody is, in some sense, an expert, able to provide an answer as helpful as it is individual. With "Artist Information," PiST turns its affinity for institutional criticism into something more productive: giving everyone a potentially "expert" status, it is transformed into a forum where people can work out the difficulties of making and displaying their art, together. In fact, PiST hopes to conclude its "Artist Information" project by arranging a series of roundtable discussions that will bring together many new-found "experts" to discuss eight questions selected from those asked at the information desk.
İstanbul’s art compass
Sancak, who has lived on the street for 20 years, points out that PiST retains a unique position in the art world as well as in its immediate community. "Turkish art schools churn out lots of artists each year," he says. "But nobody gets up and does what PiST has done." The art center has certainly been successful in making its presence known in Pangaltı, adding a new dimension to the personal rapport its founders enjoy with their long-time neighbors, and a new dynamic to life on Pangaltı Dere Street. Its unconventional use of former commercial space and 24-hour programming anchors PiST in the immediate community in a way that no other İstanbul art space manages to do. PiST will give you a map, answer your questions, and point you toward where you want to go in the İstanbul art scene. An engaging and informative project, "Artist Information" exposes both its visiting audience and its local neighbors to new worlds. Maybe it could expand its tourism theme by including one last component: a translator to work the streets of Pangaltı.
* "Artist Information" is open on Wednesdays and Saturdays (3 p.m. to 7 p.m.), at Dolapdere Caddesi, Pangaltı Dere Sokağı No. 12/14/16, Pangaltı-İstanbul. For more information, visit www.pist-org.blogspot.com
