Galerie Tanja Wagner is very pleased to present the first solo show with Nilbar Güreş.

For her works, using photography, collage, drawing and video Nilbar Güreş places everyday life realities in theatrical settings which deal with cultural identity codes, especially female or queer. A lot of her work is based on long-term research and cultural observation by employing fieldwork practices; she lives with her protagonists and experiences their environment.

The protagonists are often communities and individuals who have found ways to exist outside of social norms, subverting conventions around gender and sexuality. What Nilbar Güreş produces contain symbols and meanings of resistence that transcend boarders and social structures which contain a playfulness and a humour that make the brutal reality bearable. In her most recent mixed media collage Frozen Zebra, 2017 the chained animal has lost its stripes to the background. A large male figure in the upper right corner is wearing a bridal veil blowing air towards male/female body parts that are lurking through the strips that could easily be bars. In Jumping Bed, 2017 a bulky figure and a bed are about to be flicked away by a palm tree – not yet clear if this means freedom or abandonment.

The issues at stake deal with a strong political standpoint and opressing limitations of life, including sexism, violence and gender inequality. She subtly brings into play the defensive attitude of western society toward the traditional dress codes of cultures influenced by religion. How I Met Your Mom, 2017 is a sculptural installation that consists of a textile figure placed on the wall hat could symbolize either a veiled Muslim woman or Maria. In the center of her face is a red circle as if she were blushing. Not far away a cactus figure made out of textile is standing in a terracotta pott, turning away ashamed, trying to cover his genitals.

Her collages and objects convey a high degree of sensuous materiality – they are strangely puzzling, often charged with eroticism, and lead into a multifaceted, contradictory reality that prompts reflection.

Nilbar Güreş was born in 1977 in Istanbul, studied at the Department of Fine Arts at the Marmara University in Istanbul and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. She lives in Vienna and Istanbul.

She will have a major solo exhibition at Lentos Museum, Linz in June this year and will be participating in the Atlantic Biennale in September. Her work will also be part of the project Mutterzunge in Berlin and several group exhibitions e.g. at Jewish Museum Frankonia in Fürth and Schwules Museum in Berlin (2018).

Her works have been exhibited at Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb (2017-18); Jewish Museum Berlin (2017); MAK, Vienna (2017); 20th Biennale of Sydney, Cockatoo Island (2016); Serralves Museum, Porto (2015); Malmö Konstmuseum (2015); Artspace Auckland (2015); SeMa Biennale Mediacity Seoul (2014); EVA International Ireland’s Biennial, Limerick City (2014); The 31. Bienal de São Paulo (2014); MAK, Vienna (2013); The Istanbul Museum of Modern Art (2011); 6th Berlin Biennial (2010); Secession Vienna (2010); 11th International Istanbul Biennial (2009). And touring exhibition “Tactics of Invisibility” at Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna (2010); Tanas, Berlin (2010-11) and at ARTER, Istanbul (2011). The artist’s solo exhibitions are MQ, Vienna (2011); Künstlerhaus Stuttgart (2011); Rampa, Istanbul (2011), Iniva, London (2010-11); Rivington Place, London (2010) and Salzburger Kunstverein, Salzburg (2009).