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'I’m So Happy Because' by Bora Akinciturk at Pilevneli Gallery, Istanbul

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“[...] In this age happiness, if not obsolete, is a test, an opportunity. "To be happy is to be able to become aware of oneself without being frightened." (1) We seem to be desperate for happiness, as bookshelves, counseling rooms, and talk shows promote endless recipes for contentment. But the well-worn, feel-good bromides from the likes of Oprah, Eckhart Tolle, and the Dalai Lama seem to work about as well as a Happy Meal, happy hour, or Coke's invitation to "Pour Happiness!”. (John Zerzan, “Happiness”, 2011)

In this precarious world happiness and fear are oddly joined. People are afraid. "They are afraid," Adorno claimed, that "they would lose everything, because the only happiness they know even in thought, is to be able to hold on to something. [...]"(2) (John Zerzan, “Happiness”, 2011)

The exhibition, taking its title from a message sent to a private WhatsApp chat group which almost turned into a meme, addresses issues like peer pressure, fear of missing out, failure and various modern social misery in an absurd and abstract way. The exhibition consists of an installation and a commissioned video for the exhibition produced collaboratively with Berk Çakmakçı. The installation is replicating the habitat of a somewhat privileged millennial who is trying to detach from the brutal expectations, disinformation and depression of the real world by creating his/her own facts and minimal conformism within a tiny cave.

“I’m so happy because I’m reaping the fruits of the things I’ve strived for, made great effort for, for a long time. The lack of success had sucked for a long time”. (Aforementioned WhatsApp message, 2018)

6.6.18 — 21.7.18

Pilevneli Gallery

'Old Sun, New Sun', Group Show Curated by Andrew Sung Taek Ingersoll at Et al., S

'The Houses Of The Serpent Bearer. The 9th House' by Mónica Mays & Flora Yin-Wong

'Dream Archipelago', Group Show Curated by Sergey Guskov at Smena, Kazan

'Eternal Flame', Group Show at Shore, Vienna

'Cosmovisions', Group Show at Medusa Offspace, Brussels

'No Time To Explain' by Paul Robas at Solito, Naples

'Night Rider' by Yan Posadsky at Devyatnadtsat’, Moscow

'Funding Emotions' by Magnus Frederik Clausen and Kaare Ruud at Cantina, Aarhus

'What I felt for you was love', Group Show at Afternoon Projects, Vancouver

'Mirror Stage' by Bora Akinciturk and Ella Fleck at Shipton, London

‘Millions Now Living Will Never Die!’ by Ian Swanson at Plague Space, Krasnodar

'VEGAN' by Jack Jubb at house of spouse, Vienna

'Fresh Hell' by Jonah Pontzer at Rose Easton, London

'It's quite like Guggenheim', Group Show at Ringcenter 1, Berlin

'OUTER DARKNESS', Off-Site Project by Allyson Packer in 1698 GALISTEO, SANTA FE

'mareas' by Elizabeth Burmann at Galeria Patricia Ready, Santiago

'Vape Cloud Premonition' by Sam Hutchinson at Forth, Nottingham

'Punch-Drunk' by Yutaro Ishikawa at LAID BUG, Tokyo

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