ANTONIO COSENTINO

Antonio Cosentino collects urban stories, photographs moments and memories from his walks around the city for his artistic practice ranging from tin sculptures to paintings and drawings; he investigates the urban equations of today through the associations of memory. In his world where literature meets the quotidian Cosentino forms new but fragmented narratives on the present, past, future, the city, the other city, and home. These narratives are reflections of his production process, something he considers as cyclical, infinite and over the tangents of construction and destruction.

Following the trajectory of his previous exhibitions, a story written by Cosentino himself accompanies Jpeg Archipelago. It is not clear whether the works exhibited are created according to the story or the story is written for these works. Parallel to his production process, the concepts of today, past and future get intertwined. Through an installation that spreads into the whole exhibition space, Cosentino creates the mise-en-scene of this story. The protagonist of this story dream of a utopia called Jpeg Archipelago and plans a journey to there. Amidst these thoughts the artist and the protagonist imagine side-stories, re-live certain memories and dream of future scenarios, which are all manifested in the different elements of the exhibition.

The map at the entrance of the gallery shows an island divided into two: the south is Aura and the north is Jpeg. Aura, 2020 the tin speed boat central of the exhibition, is the vehicle by which the protagonist plans to travel to Jpeg Archipelago. Yet, the metaphor of the speedboat slips away with the factory placed on it. What will happen to the aura, Walter Benjamin’s term for the quality of an artwork that can only be communicated by the work itself and that is lost through the processes of mechanical reproduction, in the land of reproduction, of Jpeg? Will the captain flee? Will the concrete apartment building Calypso, 2020, from one of the side-stories of the exhibition, like the goddess Calypso detaining Odysseus from his journey, carry the protagonist away from his destination?

For more information about the exhibition, please contact Naz Beşcan: naz@zilbermangallery.com

Antonio Cosentino graduated from the Department of Painting, Faculty of Fine Arts at Mimar Sinan University in 1994. He founded the art initiative Hafriyat with Hakan Gürsoytrak and Mustafa Pancar in 1996. His recent exhibitions include I’m an Eye, A Mechanical Eye (curator: Naz Beşcan, Zilberman, Istanbul, Turkey, 2019), An Exile on Earth (curator: Çelenk Bafra, Zilberman, Istanbul, Turkey, 2018), Summer was a Beautiful Day (Zilberman Gallery, Berlin, Germany, 2018), School Square Galatasaray (curator: Çelenk Bafra, Pera Museum, Istanbul, Turkey, 2018), HOME IS WHERE THE (HE)ART IS (Galerie Paris-Beijing, Paris, France, 2018), HARBOR (Istanbul Modern, Istanbul, Turkey, 2017); boxes of cigarettes and whisky all over the sea, ferâre, my love (Zilberman Gallery, Istanbul, Turkey, 2016); Istanbul, Passion, Joy, Fury (curators: Hou Hanru, Ceren Erdem, Elena Motisi and Donatella Saroli, MAXXI National 21st Century Arts Museum, Rome, Italy, 2015); Mom I’m Going Out to Pour Some Concrete (with Extrastruggle, Studio-X, Istanbul, Turkey, 2015); Escape from Marmara Sea: The Stelyanos Hrisopulos (Salt Ulus, Ankara, Turkey, 2015); Departure Marmara Sea (Bergsen & Bergsen, Istanbul, Turkey, 2013) and Tin City (Külah, Istanbul, Turkey, 2013). With the collective Hafriyat, Cosentino contributed works to Spare Time, Great Work (Platform 3, Munich, Germany, 2011), and Tactics of Invisibility (Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, Austria; Tanas, Berlin, Germany; ARTER, Istanbul, Turkey 2010-2011). The artist lives and works in Istanbul.