Imaginary Interviews
INTRO – HERA & FRIDA
Hera: I am Hera, the Goddess of birth, representing abundance and fertility on earth. (Holding out the pomegranate in her hand and handing it out) Let this pomegranate I carry be a reminder of it. Would you like a taste?
Frida: Hello, Hera the Supreme; it's lovely to run into you like this. Who are the others?
(Hera points at Lady Justice, who is blindfolded and holding a scale.)
Hera: This is Lady Justice; her blindfold symbolizes impartiality to ensure that the law applies to all, regardless. (turns and points to Athena) Next to her is Athena, the Goddess of Wisdom. Her dazzling beauty is not visible to the naked eye but lies in her wisdom.
(Athena hands out blindfolds to the audience)
(Frida and Hera walk around)
Hera: And this is Onion, the God of Death and the Healer. I welcome whole humanity while Onion bids farewell to them.
Frida: Shakespeare once said, "if a play starts with birth, it's a comedy, and if it ends with death, it's a tragedy." Is everything with death in it bound to be tragic?
Hera: The real tragedy lies in the "displacement of death." Those who die in wars, exiles, and massacres turn into ghosts.
Frida – Rilke once said, "we each carry our death inside us as the fruit carries its seed." Every soul deserves a humane death, whereas the end of victims means the perishing of a soul. He lived and died like a poem after being pricked by a rose thorn.
Hera: Just as there are ghosts, there are those alive who stretch out the boundaries of mortal life by sensing the sufferings of others. For example, you remember when Hamlet spoke to a ghost and said, "the time is out of joint," or Goya said, "the sleep of reason produces monsters." Art relieves the burden of the masses through the power of representation and reconciliation, makes remembering possible, and awakens ghosts. The artist should speak the language of spirits well.
Art is about telling a dream without waking up.
All the influential artists, regarding the pains of others, have felt worse within themselves. They sought to reimburse the victim's right by representing the invisible or worse shown.
Frida - Here is an architectural structure, Hera, the seven-column Memory Theatre. It is a robot-generated version of ghost image residues and symbols circulating in different time layers with the help of artificial intelligence. Giulio Camillo set up the first memory theatre in the sixteenth century and invited all humanity to the stage. This descending structure takes us deep into our memory and past.
The seven columns represent Prophet Solomon's seven commandments of wisdom. We can only reach ourselves once we reach the point of zero, which we must trace back into our memories and remember. The deeper we dive into our past, the more we build our future.
Hera: People interact with all aspects of life, from Nature to culture. Humans of today live in a synthetic tech jungle created by other humans. Borges once said, "I alone have more memories than all men may have ever had since the world exists. . . . My memory, sir, is like a garbage heap."
The past can only be reached through works of art that remind us of our utopias, our dreams, and our promises -which are arrows shot from the past to the future. Art, like a seismograph, takes us to the ghost images within the layers of time, allowing us to remember ourselves and who we will be.
Frida- An artist might wake up one morning to find herself having forgotten her mother tongue, feeling alienated. Or she can feel a kind of closeness and familiarity with people of different times.
There is no self-image or thought that emerged out of nowhere by itself alone. Images, like ideas, have no boundaries, wandering around in a Mental Pangea.
Yes, these artworks might be made by me, but those who made me were other artists and thinkers of the past, and they have all created this artwork with me. Do you know how people invite over their parents to their graduation? I want to thank my metaphorical parents, who helped shape me and all of human history by inviting them to celebrate my graduation.
Hera: Are you ready to take a walk with me in search of a lost time, then?
(Hera offers tea and chocolate cake to the audience). As Frida dips the Malden chocolate cake into the tea, the lights turn on, and the play starts.
BODY 1 - Susan SONTAG
Susan Sontag comes out from behind the first column and enters the stage.
Frida - Dear Susan Sontag, how lovely to run into you in 2020.
There have been so many innovations after you. Advanced Technology and visuals of war flowed into our visual memory and have yet to meet our somewhat optimistic expectations.
(Everybody checks out the images of war on the TV screen.)
Susan Sontag: Photographs are propaganda tools that spur vengeance during the war so much so that war has now become merely the images and sounds playing in the backgrounds of our living rooms. The thought behind war is, "If there's blood, it does the job." We are affected the first time we see such brutal images, but the second, third, and fourth times, we just become number and number, losing our sensitivity. We swing between feelings of compassion, anger, and affirmation like a pendulum.
Showing hell does not give people an idea of how to get people out of it or how to put out the fire. Let the images of atrocities move around us like ghosts. Those images remind us what humans are capable of to prove their superiority.
The iconography of suffering has its roots in a family tree. There is no room for illusion in the scenes set by Goya. Although the settings are not necessarily those of war, the feeling to be conveyed by the "Disasters of War" is the truth itself. Goya managed to eliminate all the pitfalls of the theatricality of painting.
Frida –"How can we prevent war?
Sontag: War ravages, destroys, slaughters, slits flesh open, and rips the guts inside out. It burns, sizzles the skin, tears organs apart, and leaves you bleeding to death. It slaughters. It is barbaric. Perhaps war is in the Nature of (hu)man, yet, no ideology can justify such murders.
How can we be human if we can't sympathize with others? How can we be human if we don't know how to learn from our experiences? If we don't know how to forgive, don't we lose our humanity and become something else? Making peace is forgetting. Memory can be defective and limited to compromise. All we need to do is feel the pain of others; that's all we need to do.
The fire alarm goes off; everybody runs in panic. Sontag leaves the stage.
BODY 2 - BENJAMIN
Frida - Wait, please don't panic; I know this alarm. It was set off in a period of peace in Europe in the nineteenth century. It was the exact alarm set off in Walter Benjamin's "One-Way Street" to remind us of the moment of danger.
Benjamin once said, "Before the spark reaches the dynamite, the lighted fuse must be cut." However, when you look at the interventions of politicians, you will see their attitudes towards danger and threat are merely bureaucratic and not courteous at all.
Benjamin: Something must be done. This is a world where human beings are shaped based on human values. A technology buried in its deviance condemns Nature to silence. However, Technology should have been used to shed light on the limits of Nature and to achieve human values. (A technology steeped in its heresy condemns Nature to silence. However, Technology should be used to obtain values for the benefit of Nature and humanity.)
In this era, which can be reproduced over and over by simple mechanics, artworks and media technologies lose their aura and authenticity.
More than new technologies and media opportunities are needed to create a new humanity or revive the old. The world is facing some amnesia, a loss of memory only accelerated by technological means. Shouldn't we be setting the fire alarm in a world like this?
Benjamin sees the robot-carved sculpture of the Angel of history.
Frida - This is Klee's New Angelus Novus. It has been adapted to our age thanks to Technology. The Angel will show us the past when humankind was despaired and confused. The Angel wants to stay in the past, resurrect the dead, and put the pieces back again. But her wings are entangled in a storm blowing from heaven, so she cannot close them. Raising the cultural debris and ruins before her into the sky, the storm drags her to the future to which she always turns her back. Angelus Novus, who does not belong to her time, is the harbinger of hope.
Benjamin - You contemporaries! The important thing is whether you can make a leap from this time to another, turning your present and past into a ball of disaster and catastrophe. Most of the things you said won't happen have happened so far. Waiting for the worse is the norm now. Your eyes linger, prepared and stimulated for a fire that can occur at any moment. It doesn't make sense to reduce all this into a dichotomy of the victorious and the defeated. What is important is to fight the fire before it's too late.
Frida- You've been on the road for months, Sir. You haven't lost hope until the borders of France are sealed. The authorities must have been affected by the suicide of a young man, so much so that they opened the borders the next morning. That's why there is a mark there of you.
Frida – pointing at the signpost saying," Walter Benjamin died here! "
Benjamin - "Immortality is …leaving your mark behind," Frida.
Napoleon and his soldiers run past the stage, knocking over the decor and columns.
BODY 3 - TOLSTOY
Frida – Where did these soldiers come from? Please forgive me; I get very confused sometimes. Ah! If only all commanders had read Tolstoy's "War and Peace," there would be no war on earth.
Tolstoy enters the stage.
Tolstoy: Commanders fight one day and shake hands the next, Frida. They executed Louis XVI, and a year later, they executed those who executed him. People have drifted in time like matchsticks. So, what is bad? What is good? What to love? What to hate? What to live for? It's so complicated, isn't it?
Frida - Mr. Tolstoy, you! who else but you to talk to when it comes to conscience? You were a nobleman born into a mansion, but you felt the pain of poverty and the burden of your wealth. You thought you weren't a trustworthy representative to the masses, so you bid farewell to all your fame, glory, distinction, and nobility. You left everything, everyone, your mansion, and your books behind just to become a more authentic representation. If they do not have, neither should I; if they do not enjoy, neither should I; if they cannot write, neither should I – you thought. I recall you saying, "I want neither my land nor my house nor Anna Karenina," and there, you became immortal.
Tolstoy - Works of art are not merely the product of inspiration or the author's mood but are also about the era's dominant worldview, mentality, and ideology. I cannot exempt myself from the suffering of others.
Individual morality is the need for action. On his deathbed in Astapovo, Ivan Ilyich asked: Did I live the right life? I asked myself that question too.
Is this the right life? Do I have the right to live in wealth when there is so much poverty in the world? Is it possible to be happy when some are in misery? Do I have the right to sit down at my mansion and tell a poor peasant's story while they have to work the land to make ends meet?
Frida - Mr. Tolstoy, not only we but also the literature have had their share of this questioning
Tolstoy - Under what circumstances can one with a say speak one's mind? We know that we are made up of a society, but we sometimes need to look for areas of righteousness in capitalist society. We must aim toward a life based on the morality of poverty that was established at the expense of truth.
Frida - I am deeply indebted to you. Like-minded people are relatives living of different ages. They quote one another. When I put your words side by side, we reach the "meaning," which is our most significant loss; it is first artists and thinkers who identify and intervene in societal problems. They hear the voices of victims and amplify them.
(A gory "scream" is heard, and it appears in front of Munch's "The Scream.”)
Munch: "…as the flaming skies hung like blood and sword over the blue-black fjord and the city. My friends went on. I stood there trembling with anxiety and felt a vast infinite scream tear through Nature."
Sometimes, something has gone away, but no story or memory is left of it. It is a moment when only the artist can immortalize the screams of victims. This scream may be a call for inspiration.
BODY 4 – GOYA
Goya enters the stage.
Frida: Goya, the Witness of His Time, you are the last great master and first modern artist on the path from being a court painter towards a conscious madness. You sensed suffering that befell and reflected the timeless brutality of war on your masterpiece, the Third of May 1808.
You have depicted the horrors of war in your "The Disasters of War" (Los desastres de la Guerra). For the first time in history, the defeated was the protagonist. For the first time, the defeated gave hope. However, before you, art was used as propaganda by absolutist regimes. Artists portrayed victories until they had the courage to expose the bitter side of conflicts.
Goya - All those evil beings, animalistic faces, evil grins, and smirks are of people. The affinity and harmony of those imaginary beings are so strong that it is impossible to fully distinguish between the real and the imaginary. Even the scientist cannot determine the boundary of the art involving boots natural and the supernatural.
When my mind goes to rest and wanders off to a world of dreams, monsters are born, and the ghosts of my dreams come alive in this world as paintings. I'm Goya! It is not that difficult to hear the cries of others. It wasn't a pair of ears but only a heart I needed to hear. Lock me up. Do I care? All I need are my brushes and some paint, and I will continue living!
(Melting memories film is projected. The Notre dame relief starts to burn.)
BODY 5 – BRUNO
Frida - Although people and places change, the plot is always the same. Goya's paintings are re-made in every period. The earth is burning with fire carried from hell by people afraid of change. The German poet Heinrich Heine once said, "Where they burn books, they will also ultimately burn people," but most people turn a blind eye.
Bruno enters the stage.
Bruno - Some are naturally deaf, some because of an accident, and some refuse to hear. Books, memories, and even people are burned for warmth or fun… The same fire burns them all, the fire of ignorance.
I do not desire an immortal body as I am shipped off to my execution, and those who condemn me to the fire are more afraid than I am. I do not conceal my truth, nor am I afraid to say it. I have been among all conflicts of lightness and darkness, wisdom and ignorance, and have fought all difficulties courageously.
If you think executing me will silence the condemnation of your poor existence, you are wrong. This will not bring you salvation or relief. But the noble path of self-flourishing will, and it will be for good. The easiest and most dignified way of salvation is not through eliminating others but through self-improvement.
Frida - Mr. Bruno, with your interdisciplinary studies, you have built a memory system that will lead us to wisdom. Some sought immortality, whereas you sought immortal memory as you designed a memory theater model with new technologies.
ANONYMOUS enters the stage with drums, zurnas, and hornpipes.
BODY 6 – ANONYMOUS
ANONYMOUS - Would you erase me from your memory?
Frida - Of course, I wouldn't. I would walk the earth to trace your footsteps for hidden stories I cannot find in books.
Anonymous: The continuation of the cult of the dead is possible by keeping the deceased in memory. In ancient Greece, the body of a dead person is respected because his spirit threatened the living world. The ancestors are honored with mighty funerals and offerings for the deceased, whose right has not been served and has not been mourned, who eventually turns into a "ghost." I am such a ghost, forgotten within layers of time.
Frida - Benjamin had just said that the so-called progress is a drift and that the real traces are hidden in the depths of history. I've run into you many times. You were sometimes an Eastern scientist who wasn't allowed to speak at the stand because of his clothes, and sometimes an African sculptor whose work preceded his name. Museums and scientific magazines refer to you as "anonymous." They record the history of science and art through the land.
Anonymous: It is strange that some see themselves as the center of the world and divide the rest as East and West. They define "the other" region as primitive and inferior, only to feel their territory is superior (Olu Ogubue).
According to Butler, every life is precarious, but some lives are even more dangerous due to their identity. Only those whose lives are recognized are considered ideal artists or thinkers.
Frida - Art makes the invisible and anonymized heard, reclaiming their dignity.
Be it the day of the Dead or visions in the Icelandic auroras, my ancestors come alive in my and my tribes' memory, in our dreams. Not too different anyway, is it? Dreams and reality alike.
We are not too different, me or another, and will humbly admit to our unity. We will circulate as life itself does. And we will remember, as long as time and mind exist. Don't mind my name, and I won't follow yours. Does it matter anyways? I do not care if you or I own a word or own it at all. We are here simply to put another brick in the structure of memories and connect a little more if only we can be humane enough.
(colorful aurora visions are projected onto the walls, a dream-like, almost ritualistic surreal scene. Native Icelandic music)
(ANON DEVAM): Look around, listen. How beautiful! It's about time I dived into a journey of memories. You are not the only one paying respects today.
It starts with the whirling dance.
BODY 7 - RUMI
Frida - 13th-century Persian poet Jalaluddin al-Rumi once said, "We are like a compass, while one leg is firmly fixed on the shari'a, the other traverses the seventy-two nations." Technology has made access to information very easy. Compass is the knowledge that will lead us to wisdom. Once one leg is firmly fixed into our memory, we reach the lost values İğneli ayak belleğimizde sabitlendiğinde kaybettiğimiz değerlere ulaşırız.
Rumi enters the stage.
Rumi – "Don't grieve; Anything you lose comes in another form."
Frida - You're right, Sir. Do you know Van Gogh? He filled the sunlight into his dark room with his imagination. And Shams Tabrizi was the sun that illuminated your world, wasn't he?
Rumi: Shams were my light, my sun, and my fire.
Before I knew Shams, I would drink a bowl of soup and get full if I was hungry. If I got cold, I would throw two logs into the fireplace, warming me up.
But now, all the bowls of soup in the world would not fill me up, as I know some are hungry. If all the logs burned in my fireplace, they would not warm me up; as I know, some are cold.
Rumi: We are all one. Come close... closer... even closer! What is all this fuss for? You are me, and I am you, then why 'us' and 'them'? We are the light and the mirror of the eternal. So why fight ourselves and one another? Why does light run away from the light? We are all one, so why are we cross-eyed? Why do the rich look down on the poor? Why does the right hand look down on the left hand? Come, liberate yourself from this selfishness and reconcile with everybody. You are merely a dot on your own, but once we unite, you become an ocean, a gem.
In the drought, Khidr goes to a mountain, where no one goes, to find water for people. Those who see him with water pick up their buckets and go to that mountain but cannot find water because only those who look for water for others can reach the water of immortality.
Accompanied by Edrellezi, Rumi recites:
Come, whoever you are, come,
Religious, infidel, heretic, or pagan
Even if you promised a thousand times
And a thousand times you broke your promise
Ours is not a caravan of despair
Come, yet again, come, come.
The dance begins with Edrellezi's song / The End.