Only Rumlar Know Where the Tears Came From

Description: Counter-narratives that both evoke and erase the Turkish state’s totalizing boundaries disrupt its ideological efforts to impose a singular identity on a heterogeneous population. In this context, both the Rum community and mastic serve as analogous forces that challenge the homogenizing project of state formation: the Rum community by questioning the invention of a monolithic Turkish identity, and mastic by disrupting the notion of a fixed, localized Turkish culture. By restaging Turkey’s pluralistic past and present, the Rum community and mastic introduce incommensurable cultural temporalities, challenging the creation of a singular nation.

Materials: 41 tablets made with mastic tears, Turkish delights, two 8x10 frames, m-audio speaker, scent of mastic. Sound: readings by Maria Assimakopoulou.

Image Description: CalArts Thesis Exhibition Installation Views, ‘Hande Sever: Only Rumlar Know Where the Tears Came From’, 2018. Photo: Daniel Alcazar