Empirical Construction: Istanbul 2003

Curator: At first glance, Julie Mehretu's "Empirical Construction: Istanbul," created in 2003, feels like controlled chaos. A whirlwind of marks, lines, and geometric shapes vie for attention. What do you make of it? Editor: It’s a frenzy, isn't it? But a rather organized one. Looking closer, I’m drawn to the layers—you can almost feel the build-up of labor in each mark. I am curious to understand more about her choices in medium and application of mixed media and acrylic on canvas. Curator: It's tempting to see these layers as visual representations of history and cultural memory. The architectural plans and cityscapes peeking through suggest a palimpsest, with Istanbul as a site of continuous construction and reconstruction—literal and metaphorical. Do any particular symbols jump out to you? Editor: Yes, and notice those stark black lines radiating from a central point—they’re almost violently directional, disrupting the softer, faded imagery underneath. This piece screams process, doesn't it? I can almost envision her in the studio, responding to the materials as much as directing them. Was there a significant moment of social context she was portraying, like any large protests perhaps? Curator: Perhaps, though her work often resists simple interpretations. The energy here is undeniable; a dynamism that suggests both the exhilarating possibilities and the disorienting effects of urban expansion. The underlying city map acts as a structural guide, doesn't it? But where the map provides fixed data, her additions express possibilities and historical palimpsests through an interplay of signs and symbols. Editor: You’re right, there's definitely an anxious quality present as if growth and change threaten to erase something vital, though that erasure also feels productive, a vital way to construct meaning in its own right. Curator: That's it exactly—a process of layering, obscuring, and revealing, just like the city itself. Thanks for pointing out those layers, which also reveals the artist’s intellectual and emotional labor that the work encompasses, literally supporting each other. Editor: Thanks! It reminds me how art, as a product of skilled work and social context, shows much more when we begin by examining materiality.