"In a sense, I put aside the computer and went back to the essence of creativity: using my hands."
Standing out with her colorful works, Hayal Pozantı is one of the artists that the 10AM family gets inspiration from in terms of colors. We started to include color a lot especially in our sweatshirts and t-shirts in our 2nd collection and we plan to continue! Let's see how Hayal's process developed;
Seçil Alkış: First of all, can you tell us a little about yourself?
Hayal Pozantı: I was born and raised in Istanbul. I am the only child of a father who works as a manager in the health sector and a mother who is also an IT director in the health sector. After completing primary school in Houston, I graduated from Robert College in 2000 and then from Sabancı University's Visual Arts and Visual Communication Design department in 2004. After graduating, I started working in Beymen's creative department. For two years, I worked on window design/production, in-store decoration works for Beymen and Club Beymen, and pattern and collection works for t-box. During this process, since my personal art works started to take over, I quit my full-time job and started working freelance. While earning my living by working in different areas for the fashion and music sectors, I also started to participate in many exhibitions in Turkey and abroad. After my art works took up all my time, I applied to different master's programs abroad and was accepted to Yale University's Painting/Printmaking program with a full scholarship in 2009. During this time, I worked extensively with Peter Halley. When I graduated from the program in 2011, I moved to New York and rented a studio in Bushwick. Within months of my move, I began working with the Jessica Silverman Gallery in San Francisco. I worked briefly as an assistant for Nathan Carter, and then for a longer period as an assistant for Glenn Ligon. For the last two years, I have been working independently in my own studio. I still live in New York and have been exhibiting in various cities in the US and around the world. The most recent ones are: Solo booth at the Armory 2014 with Jessica Silverman Gallery in New York (March), Solo show with Sussanne Vielmetter in Los Angeles (November), Solo show with Duve in Berlin (November). My work will also be exhibited at the New Orleans Biennial, Prospect, in October.
SA: When we examine your works, we see that you have been making digital collages in the past, as opposed to your recent abstract works. Can you tell us a little about this transition process?
HP: Since I grew up with a computer engineer mother, I have a different relationship and communication with technology. I was raised with the slogan “the future is in computers” from a young age. Therefore, it is very important for me that my work always has a dialogue with technology. The education I received at Sabancı University also had a very important effect in this respect. The art program is definitely not limited to painting or sculpture. I went through an education process that focused on multimedia and gave special importance to conceptual art. Therefore, I was involved with computers long before I started painting. Programming, digital photography and physical installation were more prominent areas. Over time, as a result of the office life I started after graduation, I started spending a lot of time in front of the computer. When I started Yale, this time had reached the point of addiction. Especially internet addiction. I realized that I was gradually becoming isolated from real life and physicality and started spending all my time in front of the screen. This was both making me a slave to the technologies on the screen and preventing me from using my body in the creative process. When the frustration of not being able to turn what I was producing on the screen into reality without a printer became too much, I realized it was time to get away from the computer. In a sense, I put the computer aside and returned to the essence of creativity: using my hands.
SA: You are an artist who was born and raised in Istanbul and continues to live in New York. Let's talk about the effects of this situation on your art practice. Is this a conscious choice?
HP: It may sound like a cliché, but New York is truly the center of the art world. Even if they don’t live here, artists, curators, and writers come here, make connections, and see the most contemporary exhibitions. When I had the chance to stay here for a while after finishing my master’s degree, I of course wanted to take advantage of the opportunity. This gave me the opportunity to meet so many people and share my work with them.
SA: In an interview, you mentioned that while you were working in the fashion and music industries, you quickly shifted your focus to art. Can you elaborate on that a bit?
HP: The main reason I worked in fashion and music was to support myself financially while also making art. I needed to make money and my connections were more concentrated in those sectors. So, job opportunities arose in those areas. Music is still a very passionate part of my life. If I could make music, I'm not sure I would be involved in visual art.
SA: While we get the feeling that silence and calmness are dominant in your works, we also feel the harsh transition of the bold brush strokes. Can you tell us a little about your painting language?
HP: Silence and calmness are concepts that interest me more because of the effects of the screen on our focus. Our relationship with visual data has completely changed with the internet. We have experienced the data overload shock that previous generations experienced with television with the internet. Suddenly, our entire lives have been filled with devices that provide us with visual titillation 24 hours a day. In such an environment, focusing, looking at a single thing for a long time has become inconvenient and almost impossible. Our eyes look from one browser window on the computer screen to another, then to a different program, then to the phone screen and then to the television screen. As our eyes run from one screen to another, we do not know what to focus our attention on and more importantly, we forget, we even forget. In this respect, I think the importance of painting or producing objects in the physical world has increased. Both for the artist to fix their focus on a single point for a long time and for the viewers to take a break from their daily visual rush and take a breath. Silence and calmness are very important for us to be able to focus our thoughts, generate new ideas and, perhaps most importantly, perceive and interpret what is happening around us.
SA: You work with Jessica Silverman Gallery in San Francisco. What is the reason for working with a gallery outside of New York?
HP: Today, galleries are not limited to the spaces they physically exist in. There are dozens of fairs and biennials in the world, the number of which is increasing all the time. Jessica Silverman is a very comprehensive gallery in this respect. With them, I had the opportunity to show my work in New York, Chicago and Dallas, as well as San Francisco. We will go to Paris together in October. Again, I have had my work in solo and group exhibitions in many galleries that I met through them. Of course, my biggest wish is to start working with a gallery in New York as soon as possible. After all, I live there. The most important thing for me is to establish long-term relationships that progress on solid foundations without rushing. Therefore, I am sure that the right choice for me will come my way soon.
SA: Do you have any exhibition-project plans in the near future?
HP: Just last week I had a solo booth with Jessica Silverman Gallery at the Armory. My work will be shown at a biennial called Prospect in New Orleans next October.