Maşallah
Since the Gezi Park Protests of 2013, Sarp Kerem Yavuz's practice has centered on the contemporary condition of Generation Y in Turkey, and their struggle to redefine and assert themselves in a growingly conservative and nationalistic political landscape, where political discourse celebrates a reinterpreted and idealized Ottoman rule.
In Maşallah, patterns scanned from various tourism publications put out by the Turkish government, as well as designs from Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia, are projected provocatively onto figures illuminated in darkness. Depicting the human is taboo in Islamic culture, and ornamental geometry and fractal art have developed as a result of this ban. In breaking this rule by using the very product it has created, SARP challenges the residual Ottoman mentality that unquestioningly embraces a totalitarian regime, to talk about the erasure of individual identity in Turkey.