HÜSEYİN ÇAĞLAYAN, TEMPORAL MEDITATIONS: PILEVNELI | YALIKAVAK

In the film Temporal Meditations, eponymous of Chalayan’s Spring/Summer 2004 collection, the symbolic print from the collection depicted the scenery of Turkish Cypriot seafront architectures, interlaced with detailed scenes of the historical battle between the Ottomans and Venetians. Historical discourse has exemplified a view of time as sequential and progressive which has been embalmed through the use of the printed word. Hussein Chalayan is proposing to conflate past and present through historical migratory routes which compose his homeland Cyprus, using genetic anthropology as a key in determining these ethnic movements across space. These garments can be viewed as archeological talismans which morph slivers of past and present, ultimately and perhaps paradoxically becoming frozen fragments of their own archeological quest.