electron micro-graph installation by istem özen, 2019
beam me down! i want to have a walk in nature, dive in, shrink down there -tens of thousands of times- and be in awe of it all. samples are imperfect, broken, detached. experiment failed. time’s up. but no place for disheartening: one’s unworthy data is another one’s wonderland. inadvertently mesmerizing. not valuable yet priceless. now have a good look: granted it’s always there, yet is not always to be found. just look. and let the indistinctive reveal its treasure.
exhibition view by Lorenz seidler
after working as a researcher of materials science for many years while keeping her artistic passions alive and searching for ways to connect the two worlds, istem özen recently started the art & science masters program. she inquires the limits to how much the concepts and methods in basic sciences can diffuse into social sciences and arts (and vice versa), aiming for a continuum encompassing all. she looks closely at things in very small and very large dimensions, collects images, installs, writes, acts, teaches, learns.
cover image by istem özen