I remember the eyes of the dog most. Strange, isn’t it? “Why”, I ask myself, “why?” The easy feeling of mercy and pity inside me are somewhat disturbing. Mercy has something scoundrel in it. And clemency provides pseudo-mastery. I think both should stay away from me, from us. However, photography also has those sides. It can deceive or can turn into authoritarian without anyone noticing. Isn’t it so? Photography makes it possible for you to become a comfortable witness. Very clear!
Through photography, and the other forms of art, you witness life without losing your mind. You may desire to see photographs, hear stories, and watch films which may (or not) comfort you. And those who seek comfort in life have more space. In the end, it depends on capital, power and willingness to be deceived. Art, too, is not free of such comfort and deception.
Eyes of the dog! Perhaps we see ourselves in those eyes, at that moment, in that gaze. Not perhaps! Certainly. We see the misused, battered human condition in the presence of this roamer of the streets with downcast eyebrows, ears or tail. It is for a reason that there is a saying for this condition: Keeping the chin up! If it has found its way into the language, know that, it has been in the subconscious for much longer. And nowadays, tell me if there is anyone who can keep the chin up!
But there is, maybe. But, probably in vain. It is a vain attempt to deceive. Because it is obvious. It is obvious in the eyes of the dog. We, as Homo Sapiens have existed on earth for such a long long time, and now what is left to us is that gaze of dogs, the independence and purrs and meows of cats. That is all! That is all left to us from nature. We even shape that life, the life that trickles from the cracks, according to our rights and wrongs. We search for ourselves in the eyes of the dog. What a great foolishness!
Maybe it is masochism. I mean to search for discomfort instead of comfort in art. However, I have been always from those who look for discomfort in art. And the photographs in this collection are from the same land. We cannot find comfort in them. They provide life. Just life. As it is. Not sedative, not silencing. Because we can find laughing of children in life but also waves of a half face. There are many roads in life, roads which open to many places at the same time. Those photographs come from those places. Or those photographs open to those places. To the roads.
I have always loved roads. Not the highways but the winding stretches of country roads between two mountains which give you the feeling of leading to the unknown, with the vehicles passing by now and then, leaving enough time for you to think about their story. Such are the roads in Serkan’s photographs. Not the busy, dizzying ones, but the roads with stories. Smoky, dark, and hazy.
These are the roads which are striking like a Nina Simone song (Black is the Color of My True Love’s Hair), lonesome as a Jacques Brel song (La Chanson des Vieux Amants) and tender yet stormy just like in the sound of Chet’s trumpet (Almost Blue). Or something else, a huge collection of photographs. From the nineties: Kent Ozanları [1].
Fortunately, Serkan titled his collection ‘On the Road’. It takes the reader, listener or the follower to different places.
What an unexpected blast, these photographs are.
These photographs encourage everyone to hit the road and find their own route. Yet they, after a while, also encourage everyone to look back and think about their road.
This work is the collection of little moments which were gathered as life fleeted by. Days are busy and fast nowadays, aren’t they?
Nowadays, roads are just for passing by. As soon as possible. In such a speed that even doesn’t leave behind any moment. Let us not have such roads.
Let us have railways. With huge stations. Not for the speed trains though. Let us meet at stations where our longing ends and wanderlust begins. These photographs should be regarded as a call to such journeys. Cause, living is sort of being on the road. Living is sort of going without a knowledge of road.
The sum of the roads we take and the roads we leave behind is called Life. How strange!
It may not look like a road movie, (in fact, it really was!) yet there are frames from the film La Haine in Serkan’s moments. Dark. Noir. In this collection, there are frames which build up our past, which make a call to recall the moments that we think we have buried and thus felt relieved. A call to pin up the images of these moments on our collars.
Like La Haine, there are angry gazes in these photographs. These are the looks of a person who catches the moment. Angry at himself, at us, at the people in the frame, at life itself. When the time comes, with various swear words on the tip of his tongue, he is ready to curse at anyone and anything, including himself.
He is a rebel, but at the same time he is humane, outspoken, sincere and genuine. Serkan.
Angry, at the same time he is certain of his anger. He is insistent at his own self, but at the same time indifferent. It is the looks of a person who wants to break through to the other side, rather than try to better this life. Angry, hearty, truthful and honest. Like water. Like night. Calm but distressing. You may lose your way. You may also find yourself in unexpected places.
While writing all this, I memorize: there is a term for ‘epilogue’ in medicine. When going back and forth between life and death, living and burying, thinking one has buried and being wrong, I remember that term: post-mortem. But I say to myself, these photographs are post-vital, as much as they are post-mortem. That is, they are photographs that make us say we have lived, we are living.
How strange! Another thing comes to my mind while writing this: My job. Psychiatry. Mine is a medical and very much a post-vital job in fact. That’s probably the reason I feel so close to the photographs. There are post-vital moments in these frames. Yes, these are the moments we live.
Can we really say ‘we have lived, we are living’? Do we?
For my part, I am a little uncertain.
But we should say. We could. Photographs in this collection are a call to say so.
This is a call for everyone to look post-vital and be able to say ‘I am living’.
We should again come together and drink in one of those taverns in the back streets of Basmane. We should again come together like living.
And after that, I am sure that you will uncover the moments in which we live but miss, the moments we just pass by, and the moments we bury while living.
Thank you.
[1] An collective album from 1990s, Urban Poets.
* Written for the book by Serkan Çolak, On the Road, Izmir, February 2019
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