2015 » Turkey » Student Section

The Colorless of Urbanization

Are we paying adequate attention to cultural and artistic life? Because of our country’s rapid urbanization, artistic life results from a colorless and passionless world.

As one of Turkey’s three universities offering the study of stage design, for PQ 2015 we have decided to focus on the theme of “music”, in which the concepts of “politics” and “air” are combined as well.

When we listen to the sounds of cities, we hear unique sounds that are characteristics to each city. In our cities, the most characteristic sounds are those of the sea, seagulls, ferries and traffic, all blended together. As we move towards green areas, we increasingly hear the sounds of nature. However, with rapid urbanization, increasing construction noises are grumbling everywhere, coming together to form one loud noise that dominates the city and destroys the cities’ characteristic sounds and textures. As the number of shopping malls and skyscrapers increases day-by-day, further intruding into our lives, our cultural and art organizations – which are not given the importance and value they deserve – fade away one by one. The Atatürk Cultural Center, at one time considered the country’s most competent institution covering all the artistic disciplines, was once a symbol of art in Turkey. But for the past seven years, it has been left to its fate, to disappear.

This deep silence has led to a desertification of our country’s cultural and artistic life, which is fast becoming a colorless, passionless and numb world devoid of color, rhythm and musical harmony. Meanwhile, the mechanical and cacophonous sounds of rapid, unplanned urbanization spread throughout our lives and suppress the world of harmony.

The PQ exhibition emphasizes this threat to our country’s cultural and artistic life. The exhibition area is thus designed on a “stave”, the main element of musical notation, consisting of five lines with four intervals. Our “stave” has no keys, measures or notes, except for the “repeat” symbol denoting the “grumbling noises” of rapid, unregulated urbanization.

The costumes and stage models located on the stave are designed in white in order to symbolize the colorlessness of a world without music. By comparison, the effects of rapid urbanization are emphasized through concrete examples.