The over 500-piece travel photograph archives of French Archaeologist Camille Enlart, which Center for Visual Arts and Research (CVAR) / Severis Foundation added to their collection in 2016, met art lovers at Girne Art Rooms Gallery where in an event that was organised by The Arkin University of Creative Arts and Design (ARUCAD) in collaboration with Severis Foundation together.
The exhibition, organized jointly by ARUCAD and Severis Foundation, was very important in that it included the travel photograph archive of French Archaeologist Camille Enlart, covering the years 1896 and 1901. It is also of great importance in terms of covering the project of revitalizing and photographing the spaces.
The first exhibition of the project, which includes photographs of ARUCAD students Bahire Akmandor, Elis Ertepınar, Mehveş Beyidoğlu, Tanya Güryel and Tijen Yakup, had taken place in October at the Severis Foundation building. The second phase of the project’s exhibition was presented to art lovers with the opening cocktail held at Girne Art Rooms Gallery on January 24.
Severis: “I am proud of this cooperation”
Speaking at the opening of the exhibition, Severis Foundation founder Rita Severis expressed that she was very pleased that Camille Enlart was exhibited in the Girne Art Rooms Gallery in collaboration with ARUCAD, and that this collaboration made her proud.
She said “The exhibition is the biggest work that has documented/recorded 19th century photographs of Cyprus. This is not only a photography exhibition but also an important exhibition documenting the past of Cyprus.”
Rita Severis thanked ARUCAD Students for their photos of reviving the ancient structures of Cyprus from the same perspective, and said that they have done an excellent job.
Severis also stated, at the end of his speech, that they will hold a conference in March or April in order to study the works of the ancient times of Cyprus, and the articles that will appear at the end of the conference will be published in a book together with the photo project.
Bal: “The exhibition witnesses both new transformations and extinctions”
Project Coordinator (of the exhibition), Instructor at the Photography and Video Department at ARUCAD, Assist. Prof. Dr. Gülsen Bal gave a speech and gave information about the project.
Bal said, “The exhibition is very meaningful in terms of reading how the new ‘moments’ can be freed by going beyond historical encounters and re-creating new social memories. One of the most important factors that got our attention during the construction of the exhibition was the call for witnessing both new transformations and certain extinctions, despite the experiences of history in the archive brought together by Rita Severis”
She stated that the society will read again in frozen moments, where geography meets the age we live in, begs the questions ‘how long ago?’ and ‘how much it is now?’. With this statement, she also said: “This exhibition has come up as the evidence that these traces, of the past, still exist today. It was this curiosity that drove us and our students to pursue this adventure.”
The exhibition will be open to visit at Girne Art Rooms Gallery every day between 12.00-21.00, except Tuesday, until 28 February 2020.