turkish words of german origin are jolting over the white stipes like disrupted biographies. Turkish language contains 92 germanisms till now,thoughout the course historical incidences like the word haymatlos during the second world war.
Depending on the viewingpoint of the spactator it is possible to decodethe words.
Diaprojection on Window. We see clouds of 40 different german predicates surrounded by their prefixes. Each cloud crates or contains multiple meanings. They encode and decode themselves depending on the viewing point of the spectator from inside or outside of the gallery. A collection and examination of a particular phenomenon of german language.
Ex Text Reading - 2013
projectroom Muthesius Kunsthochschule
Photographs by Ruth Biene
In a performance of sorts a text is read, wich is no text, but once has been a text. By listening to this "ex-text" it seems to bear traces of words, wich evokes multiple associations. The listener assumes meaning, temporary something falls in to place, at times it is just absurdity but not nonsense and elsewhere there is no language anymore. How much similarity to words is required to find meaning in it or to assingn it to meanings? What do or can we understand and what do we want to understand? Welche Assoziationen knüpfen wir in der Freiheit des Textes? What mental connections may appear?
ex text:
"So ne kolar - akkar si mi zacik abil ir ler - Cog un lug uf ark like lime grup la rinaa it ol mak - laber aber bukel ime ler in bazilarinin - ik i dilde de ayni göre - ..."
original text:
"Son ek olarak karsimiza cikabilirler. Cogunlugu farkli kelime gruplarina ait olmakla beraber bu kelimelerin bazilarinin iki dilde de ayni göre..."
(the origin is a linguistic turkish text by Aygün, Mehmet: ALMANCA VE TÜRKCE'DEKI SESTES KELIMELER VE BU KELIMELERIN HER IKI DILDEKI KARSILIKLARI VE FONKSIYONLARI S. 54. It deals with homophone words (false friends) in german and turkish language and theirs differences and theirs usages in in each language.)
false friend - objectinstallation
projectroom Muthesius Kunsthochschule 2013
This work is one of the semantical examinations ralating to the phenomenon of false friends (homographic word pairs in two different languages which have diverging references of meanings). This piece looks like a socle. Usually it's only function is to carry art, but not in this case. The socle as a minor matter becomes the principal thing. At a close look we might light on the 4 peepholes. Their point of view, arranged at hip-height, is not convenient for the viewer. It literally brings them to their knees. Otherwise to get knowledge you sometimes need to bend to get another point of view, like the fenomenologs are used to do. If you look inside of one of the spyholes into the inner of the assumed socle, you see the writing of a word (in this case german language) like tabak = tabacco (in english language it could also be the word gift, wich is an english-german false friend. The meaning of the german word gift in english is poison). The writing it self is transparent so you can look through the word and see the image of a plate behind in the illuminated core. The image apparently has nothing to do with the word in font, but actually it has. It is the signified of the signifier of a homograf in another language. In fact the assumed german word tabak turns to be a foreign word wich pictures it's signified, in this case a turkish homograph.
Foto Ruth Biene
Kaleidoscope - Objectinstallation
2013
Photograph: Ruth Biene
An examination with structural approach takes place in this little object. If all (knowledge of) the rules of our sign system disappeared, there would be nothing else for it but trying to order the chaos and create words by mechanic manipulating of fortune. Is it the knowledge of words or the knowledge of game rules that makes us able to talk and bulid sentences and interact with eachoter, just like Wittgenstein constitutes it in his "Philosophical Investigations"?
A diapositiv of fotograph from a 2005 made selfportrait painting of mine (created in front of a mirrow) is destroyed and transformed into letters, forming a whole alphabet and swimming in a water filled repository, used for building the kaleidoscope.
Bilingual Sentences - installation
in open space 2012
I create bilangual sentencesimilarities. Both sentences are homographic and comply with the grammatical rules of their languagesystems. The particular meanings of the homographic sentences differ from each other. So these sentences carry a secret message. Such sentences exist in every single language of the entire world and I try to discover and share them.
In this case I searched for those existing between german an turkish language.
I install these sentences in the centre of Kiel-Gaarden, a quater where lots of turkish and german speekers live. By doing so I give reason to have an exchange and discourse with each other.
leb leb in legende (german) = live live in legend
leblebin legende (turkish) = Your sugernuts are in the basin
Bilingual Homos - dictionary 2011
All the turkish words, that originate from german language are assembled in this dictionary. The words are printed on slightly transparent bred paper. There is only one word on each page together with its explication, etymologic and grammatical information.
Wortgeflecht / word clash - clanginstallation
2011
The research of bilingual Homographs and loanwords are the basis for this work. What you hear are audiofiles from turkish-german Onlinedictionaries. The german and the turkish voice are alternately speaking out the related turkish and german words. Sometimes it may give the impression that they talk to eachother, that they correkt the pronounciation of the otherone, that they attack the other with words or that they give eachother nicknames.
Flört - Videoinstallation
Play/Pause Offspace Galerie Exlex 2011
Throughout the course of german-turkish history lots of loanwords emerged in turkish language and in german language.
In this installation those originating from german language are projected by a beamer on a column forest of sorts and roll from the right to the left side over the different projection surfaces. By doing so the words are getting deconstructed.
Do they loose there meanings? Are new words arising?
Wanna be II - videoperformance 2010
In the style of a very common representation of pop icons I am recurrently repeating the same sentence with different emphasis, the desire "I wanna be you" is directed at the spectator.
Where are the boundries of our own identity, how does it feel to be close to another personality? What is jealousy? Can you become someone else by convincing you to belive you are somebody else? Does it destroy yourself if you make yourself belive that you want to be someone else? Is it kind of a selfdestruction to get rid of yourself? How do words affect the reality?
Projection - videoperformance 2008
What is identity? Is it possible to lose your identity? Are you, what the others see in you, an image they project onto you? Or do you create the idea they got of you?
Videoperformance 2008
Memory chamber / thinking out of the box -
installation 2008
What is memory? A man in a small chamber underneath the stairs is autistically giving hisself up to arbitrary doings. Threw a spyhole the spectator is able to observe him. Over headphones you hear a self-talk about memory and the declaiming of quotations wich had been recorded in the chamber before. The doubling, overlaying and repeating of the monologe snatches evokes the impression that one can listen to the thoughts of another person. The visitors were also invited to go into the chamber and think and ruminate a while and listen to there own memory voice.
„Language is nothing but memory, because it can be nothing else.“ Fritz Mauthner
Yasmin Schaffer Interlingua Sprache Medienkunst Medien Medienklasse yasminschaffer linguistik artistic research
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