“Just For The Hell of It” solo exhibition by Berkay Tuncay at DIANA New York – presented by SANATORIUM

Sat, Mar 30 - Sun, Apr 28  2024

“Just for the Hell of It” showcases Tuncay’s works that reflect on the impact of the internet and digital culture, employing traditional methods like embossing, screenprint, and vinyl letterings, in addition to an ASMR video installation.

SANATORIUM is pleased to present Berkay Tuncay’s first solo show in the USA, titled “Just for the Hell of It,” which will be on view March 30 – April 28, 2024, at DIANA New York. The exhibition takes its title from a poem by the poet Orhan Veli.

In his latest series, ‘Passive Aggressive Poems,’ inspired by symbols decorating Instagram bios, Tuncay constructs text-like forms. He experiments with visual poetry, showcasing enlarged glyphs and symbols, building on his exploration of text.

The video installation ‘Poems from Instant Messaging (ASMR)’ stems from Tuncay’s poetry book of the same name. ASMR videos, known for their tingling sounds like whispering and unpacking, serve as the source of inspiration here. In the video, the poems used are expanded versions of internet acronyms, organized alphabetically to resemble instant messaging dictionaries.

In ‘Poems from Relaxation Videos,’ he investigates how smartphones and laptops contribute to soothing stress caused by that same technology. In this work, he also deals with found words, sourced from relaxation videos on YouTube. He extracts them from the screen, formulates them into poems mimicking captcha codes, and gives them a spatial presence. Similarly, in ‘Descriptive Noise,’ the inspiration for the work comes from the script of the TV series “Mr. Robot.” Treating these subtitles as found poetry, he assembles the descriptive noises from the series into an experimental poetry format.

“Just for the Hell of It” consists of Tuncay’s works that examine possibilities of poetry and internet based communication and invites us to explore his research on the impact of the internet and digital culture. The exhibition can be visited between March 30 – April 28, 2024, from Thursday to Sunday, 12:00-6:00 pm.

About the artist

Berkay Tuncay’s practice is based on investigating the effects of the internet on society and the human psyche. He examines the intersection points of internet culture, archaeology, psychology, and language. He transforms images, texts, and memes that are circulating online into offline prints, videos, poetry books, and installations. He has taken part in numerous international group exhibitions. His selected solo exhibitions include: ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ [Fancy Text], KUUB.Space, Utrecht (2024); Human, how strange, so vulgar, such a masterpiece and yet so primitive, Sanatorium, Istanbul (2020); Getting Away With It All Messed Up, Display, Berlin (2018); Life Is What Happens To You While You Are Busy Watching Cute Cat Videos, Gaia Gallery, Istanbul (2016); and I’M SORRY, BECAUSE I DANCE, De Kijkdoos, Amsterdam (2011). He has participated in several artist residency programs, including Jan van Eyck Academie, Delfina Foundation, Cité Internationale des Arts, and ArtCenterIstanbul.

About DIANA

CARBON 12 (DUBAI), Macaulay & Co (VANCOUVER), and FIERMAN (NEW YORK) are very pleased to announce the opening of DIANA NEW YORK, a cooperative exhibition space in New York at 127 Henry Street, Chinatown. DIANA will feature rotating exhibitions organized by the founding partners as well as by guest galleries and independent curators. An exhibition at DIANA, up to two months in duration, will allow for sustained engagement with the critics, collectors, curators, and artists both based in and traveling through New York. The gallery space itself is a small storefront steeped in the New York history of independent galleries presenting ambitious work. Originally the studio space of Bozidar Brazda and subsequently Ryan Foerster, 127 Henry Street has hosted over fifteen years of exhibitions while Bureau, Chapter NY, and FIERMAN have held tenancy. As programming develops, DIANA will solicit exhibition proposals from galleries and independent curators.