AHMET ÖĞÜT + ELLA DEN ELZEN: FORMS OF BRAVERY

Ahmet Öğüt + Ella den Elzen
Forms of Bravery

Thursday, February 20, 6–7:30pm
Followed by reception — RSVP HERE

National Academy of Design
519 West 26th Street, 2nd Floor, Chelsea, New York

Protocinema and the National Academy of Design invite you to join us for an engaging conversation titled Forms of Bravery with artist Ahmet Öğüt and artist and curator Ella den Elzen, Curatorial Assistant, Dia Art Foundation, to explore themes central to their respective practices, the role of art in public spaces, the intersection of art and social engagement, and the ways in which participatory experiences challenge and reshape our understanding of contemporary art and the built environment. Ahmet Öğüt is a renowned conceptual artist known for his thought-provoking installations and participatory projects. Ella den Elzen’s work considers and critiques the politics and policies of the built environment.

In this conversation between Öğüt and den Elzen, Öğüt will discuss recent and upcoming artworks including Safe return of the Evacuated, 2024, returning the exact reproductions of three pieces created by significant Ukrainian artists and public figures—Alla Horska, Zoya Lerman, Serhiy Zhadan—to the daily bombed city Kharkiv; Balanced Protest Banners: Bangladesh, 2023, in which performers walk on bamboo stilts that are both support structures and also protest banners highlighting difficult-to-find goods; and Monuments of the Disclosed, 2022, recently acquired by the Guggenheim Museum, New York, a series of nine digital monuments dedicated to nine historical whistleblowers, enhanced with Augmented Reality (“AR”) components. These individuals exposed the fraud, malintent, and wrongdoing of unfettered power, often at tremendous personal sacrifice; and, more often than not, remain unrecognized for their acts of courage. These important whistleblowers are: Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, Kimberly Young-McLear, Marlene Garcia-Esperat, Bunnatine “Bunny” Greenhouse, Mona Hanna-Attisha, Li Wenliang, Phillip Saviano, Karen Silkwood, Aaron Swartz. Growing contention in the U.S and abroad and the complete disregard for human rights are shaping citizens’ public lives and directly affecting who has the ability to tell which truths.

Öğüt shares these concerns with the artists in the National Academy of Design’s current two-part exhibition, Past As Prologue: A Historical Acknowledgment, and with present-day audiences, both of whom engage with past ideologies and consider how these histories shape our collective futures. Past as Prologue examines how artists have envisioned a more expansive notion of cultural identity, through artworks imbued with the values of activist movements that have recast this country’s political landscape over the last century. Both parts of the exhibition feature several artworks that critically address monuments, including Mitch Epstein’s large-scale photograph of the graffitied Robert E. Lee Memorial Marcus-David Peters Circle, Richmond, Virginia, 2020, Kara Walker’s reinterpretation of the memorial to Queen Victoria, titled Fons Americanus, 2019, and Patricia Cronin’s Memorial to a Marriage, 2002, which commemorates same sex marriage years before it became legal. Similarly, Den Elzen's work includes consideration and critiques of historical modes of representation, and forms of knowledge-production and preservation. In the context of the National Academy of Design’s community of artists and architects, this discussion of public art provides a meeting point for dialogue between the two practices reflecting values central to the Academy’s mission.

About the Speakers

Born in Silvan, Diyarbakir, Ahmet Öğüt works across different media and has exhibited widely, including solo exhibitions in institutions such as Van Abbemuseum, State of Concept Athens, Kunstverein Dresden, Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Chisenhale Gallery; Berkeley Art Museum; and Kunsthalle Basel. He has also participated in numerous group exhibitions, including; Sense of Safety, Yermilov Centre Kharkiv (2024) Dhaka Art Summit (2023); FRONT International 2022, Cleveland Triennial for Contemporary Art, Ohio (2022); Asia Society Triennial: We Do Not Dream Alone (2021); In the Presence of Absence, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2020); Zero Gravity at Nam SeMA, Seoul Museum of Art (2019); Echigo Tsumari Art Triennale (2018); the British Art Show 8 (2015-2017); the 13th Biennale de Lyon (2015); Performa 13, the Fifth Biennial of Visual Art Performance, New York (2013); the 7th Liverpool Biennial (2012); the 12th Istanbul Biennial (2011); the New Museum Triennial, New York (2009); and the 5th Berlin Biennial for Contemporary Art (2008). Lives and works in Amsterdam and Istanbul.

Ella den Elzen is a curator and artist based in New York. Her work considers and critiques the politics and policies of the built environment, historical modes of representation, and forms of knowledge-production and preservation. She is currently a curatorial assistant at Dia Art Foundation. Previously, she was a Helena Rubinstein Curatorial Fellow at the Whitney Independent Study Program (2023-24) and a curatorial assistant at the Canadian Centre for Architecture (2020-2023). She has taught Contemporary Architectural Theory at the University of Waterloo with a focus on subjectivity and modern property, and Design Studio at McGill University.

Special Thanks to: The National Whistleblower Center, Washington DC; the team at the National Academy of Design, especially Sara Reisman, Ian Cofré, Frank Dallas; Noam Segal, Nato Thompson, Masha Isserlis, and Hanns Lennart Wiesner.

This program has been organized collaboratively by Protocinema and the National Academy of Design.

Protocinema is an itinerant cross-cultural art organization that commissions and presents site-aware art around the world. Our purpose is to support dialogue between cultures on equal footing. Protocinema works towards an understanding of difference across regions through its exhibitions, commissions, public programs, screening tours, mentorship, the Protocinema Emerging Curator Series (PECS), and Protodispatch, a digital publication. Protocinema was founded in 2011 by Mari Spirito. Protocinema.org

The National Academy of Design promotes art and architecture in America through exhibition, education, and research. Founded in 1825, the National Academy is the leading honorary society for visual artists and architects in the United States. We advocate for the arts as a tool for education, celebrate the role of artists and architects in public life, and serve as a catalyst for cultural conversations that propel society forward. As we look to our 200th anniversary in 2025, we will shape and implement new forms of service to artists and architects and dissolve long-standing barriers to culture to foster a community that transcends backgrounds, disciplines, and beliefs. Our work will advance a national conversation about visual art and design and reimagine cultural advocacy for the 21st century. Past as Prologue: A Historical Acknowledgment, Part II, is co-curated by Sara Reisman, Chief Curator, and Natalia Viera Salgado, Associate Curator, and is on view until April 26, 2025. nationalacademy.org

Press inquiries: Sidian Liu sidian@protocinema.org or Mari Spirito mari@protocinema.org, +1 917 660 7332
& Lucille Sadek lsadek@nationalacademy.org or Hannah Gottlieb-Graham (ALMA) hannah@almacommunications.co