NEW YORK, NY.- Marlborough Gallery announced the opening of an exhibition of work by Turkish artist Ahmet Güneştekin. The exhibition continues through February 4th. In this, the artist’s first solo exhibition at Marlborough Gallery since 2013, Güneştekin lends his signature detailed, combed brushwork, rich symbolism, graphic lines and intense color schemes to artwork in textiles, ceramics, and metal, in addition to oil on canvas works.
In addition to paintings, ceramics and textile works, Ahmet Güneştekin: New Works, includes metal screens and 3-D wall-relief metal paintings, which are his own unique creations. These mixed-media works include concave mirror, metal and photographic elements which come together to evoke the sun, that arbiter of light and time passing. The amalgam of parallel lines, curves and circles, which often create a kinetic interplay use the effects of Op-Art to emphasize the presence of the sun. Another large work in the exhibition, Autoportrait, Dhul Qarnay Series, (2016), a mixed media cabinet of curiosities containing skulls and horns that have been painted and combined to create a modern Medusa-like tale silently but unforgettably told in three dimensions.
In Inconsolable Pain of Prometheus (2014), the artist combines broad swathes of deeply saturated color in graphic shapes; soft arcs, hard-lined rectangles, drawing the eye to a blue orb, with delicately rendered patterns in shades of gray. The figures, which repeat themselves in the artist’s work throughout the exhibition, evince the symbols in traditional Turkish rugs. Here, however, the symbols are of the artist’s own design, and speak directly to his own visual language and expressive codes. He draws inspiration from multiple cultures and diverse sources: Turkish folk tales, Greek mythology, and ancient stories from Mesopotamia and Anatolia. Güneştekin’s titles for his paintings, such as Swan and Leda’s Day of Love, Wings of the World of One Thousand and One Colors, Icarus Who Can’t Reach the Sun, give clear clues to their origins and layers of history and meaning.
Ahmet Güneştekin was born and raised in Batman, Turkey, in the Garzan workers’ camp. His father labored to provide for his large family, but encouraged his son to pursue art by collecting cement sacks on which Güneştekin could paint. Güneştekin studied at the Istanbul State Academy of Fine Arts for a short period of time and in 2010 he established “Güneştekin Art Studio” in Beyoğlu, Turkey. Güneştekin has participated in several solo and group exhibitions, including Momentum of Memory in Venice, Italy in 2013 and numerous exhibitions in Turkey.
