ISTANBUL MODERN

Chiharu Shiota’s installation “Between Worlds,” wraps the entire gallery with web-like red threads and places the suitcases inside this intricate mass, emphasizing the theme of “presence in the absence.” Red, the color most frequently used by the artist, represents the flow of blood and life coursing through veins, metaphorically connecting people, emotions, and memories. Each suitcase represents an individual from the artist’s perspective. Tied together with red threads, these suitcases create a visual narrative that makes the viewer question both personal and collective themes such as home, belonging, and identity. In this manner, Shiota weaves concepts of time, space, movement, and memory into her installations, and invites the viewers to engage both physically and emotionally to complete their experience. Beyond the objects they carry, suitcases also serve as conveyors of symbols, carrying emotions and memories, bridging the past and the future.

Between Worlds centres on the artist’s sense of being “somewhere in between.” In the Istanbul context, this means the location between Asia and Europe that permeates the city, and the Museum’s location in Karaköy, home to Istanbul’s historic harbour. The artist weaves a connection between the ships docking and departing from the harbour, the passengers with their luggage and memories, their migration stories. Chiota’s own migration story (born in Japan, raised in Berlin) is an element here too, while she draws inspiration from Istanbul’s cosmopolitan identity “Between Worlds” constructs a contemplative space that invites viewers to reflect on their own lives, memories, and relationships within the broader universal context of humanity. Shiota’s threads are not only immersive, beautiful and eerie, but also invite us into the labyrinth of our own inner world.

The piece is beautifully installed and curated in a space that feels private and invites contemplation and dreaming. Being inside the labyrinth of threads feels both comforting and contained – and also like being trapped in a spider web. The feeling of veering between comfort and discomfort is, I think, key to good art.

I visited the work when I arrived at the Museum and then again before I left. It was two wholly different experiences. My first walkthrough was filled with wonder and amazement at Chiota’s idea and skills. I felt joyful and buoyed up by being inside the threads, enjoying the strange perspectives. Hours later, after viewing the Museum, having lunch, and enjoying the café terrace for a while, I visited again. This time, I felt wistful. I became more aware of the abandoned suitcases. The threads felt more oppressive. I recalled that for some, leaving is an escape, but we are always drawn back to our roots, the threads binding us, however thin they may be.

Artist: Chiharu Shiota
Curator: Öykü Özsoy Sağnak
Assistant Curator: Yazın Öztürk

https://www.istanbulmodern.org/en