Free play!
Ecem Yüksel, Burak Ata
Curated by Tuna Pektaş
From the KENDI Collection
24.03.2023 – 06.05.2023

‘’Play is superfluous. The need for it is only urgent to the extent that the enjoyment of it makes it a
need. Play can be deferred or suspended at any time. It is never imposed by physical necessity or
moral duty. It is done at leisure, during ‘’free time’’. Only when play is a recognised cultural fiction
– a rite, a ceremony – it is bound up with notions of obligation and duty. Here, then, we have the first main characteristic of play: that it is free, is in fact freedom.’’ – Johan Huizinga

With reference to Johan Huizinga’s 1938 book Homo Ludens, Free play! brings the works of Ecem
Yüksel and Burak Ata together around the concept of game, creates a playground for the audience and
invites them to stay in the game and to be a team. In the spotlight of the exhibition are two new works by Ecem Yüksel and Burak Ata, produced with support from KENDİ.

The artist duo who have been think and producing art together for many years while sharing the same
studio, are teaming up against the game through Free play!. Surrounded by thousands of toys, they
write their own rules in this universe of game. Both artists use paper as a central medium in their
practice. While transferring the snapshots they have taken into watercolour, they feel liberated and
freed before the levitating lightness of paper. Paper is always with them, wherever they want. At their desk, at a football game or as they stand before some scenery...

Ecem Yüksel and Burak Ata host in paintings those players and spectators whom they saw, witnessed, accumulated, and held within their collection of observations. They now invite those spectators to be
players in their own playground.

Play incorporates and liberates. It absorbs. Play casts a spell over us; it is "enchanting",

"captivating". – Johan Huizinga