Cevdet Erek

Cevdet Erek uses space, time and sound as elements that move together in his works. In his work called Courtyard Ornamentation with 4 Sounding Dots and a Shade, and a Synagogue, he invites the audience to the shadows just like Lifanova does. His work, located in the garden of Mekor Hayim Synagogue, is an adaptation of the Courtyard Ornamentation with 4 Sounding Dots and a Shade, which the artist produced for the 11th Sharjah Biennale in 2013. In addition, another version of the work called Courtyard Ornamentation with 4 Sounding Dots and a Prison was shown at the 5th Marrakech Biennial in 2014. In this work, which was specially produced for the courtyard of Mekor Hayim Synagogue, the parts of a rhythm emanating from the speakers placed at four different dots can only form a meaningful whole when they unite under the shade. The sound samples used as a source for the work are obtained by blowing the shophar made of ram horn, which is used by the Jews on their special and holy days. The artist creates a space for the thought of rhythm when proposing the interrelationships of sound patterns consisting of rhythmic repetitions rather than visuality regarding the "ornamentation" of architecture. In his book Rhythmanalysis, French thinker Henri Lefebvre mentions that the harmony between different rhythms creates an alliance as he explains the bond of social relations with rhythm. The collapse of the relationship between different elements that make up the society for various reasons reveals arrhythmia in time or space.2 The combination of repetitions, which Lefebvre defines to be cyclical and linear, constitutes the measure of rhythm, that is, time.3 The space, where we listen to the street through its window all day, gives us information about that space with its concrete and abstract rhythms. The data that can lead to the source of the space can be reached when these rhythms come together. Lefebvre says that intervening in a space with rhythm has the purpose of strengthening the eurhythmy.4 The intention of the setup of Cevdet Erek’s Courtyard Ornamentation with 4 Sounding Dots and a Shade, and a Synagogue in this space is to open the space where more than one rhythm will affect each other creatively. Accordingly, it is the search for finding the eurhythmy of a healthy body in today's society by way of eliminating the arrhythmic situation where something goes wrong. The work, created by Erek with his rhythmanalist delicacy, incorporates gracefully to silence, allowing us to see the lost other again under the shadow and discover what togetherness would bring back.
2 Henri Lefebvre, Rythmanalysis, Translated by Ayşe Lucie Batur, Sel Publications, Istanbul, 2017, p.96.
3 Op. cit., p.32.
4 Op. cit., p.96.
5 Op. cit., p.40.