About the Artist
Sera Boeno (1991) is a sculptor and installation artist from Istanbul, Turkey. Her praxis is research-based and heavily influenced by the socio-politics of her motherland, Turkey. Narratives of and around women in historically silenced topics –politics, sex, religion, trauma– are central to her work. Concrete, metal, wood, found objects make the foundations of her practice. Boeno holds a B.A. from Dartmouth College with in Neuroscience and Studio Art, and an M.F.A from Rinehart School of Sculpture at Maryland Institute College of Art with focuses in curatorial practice, critical studies and art education. She is the recipient of several awards and grants including the Hamitonian Fellowship and Amalie Rothschild '34 Award for her work. Boeno has worked in various creative projects between Turkey, Japan and the United States. She is currently based in Baltimore, MD.Sera Boeno website View Website Sera Boeno website View Gallery
Artist's Statement
Silenced topics –politics, sex, religion, psychology, trauma– are central to my artistic inquiry. I explore these topics by re-placing the personal and finite within the universal and perpetual. I seal in wax and catalog memories; I make objects out of experiences with mental illness; I sculpt news stories of victims of “honor” killings; I install women’s relationships with their bodies on walls; I erect stele from misogynist quotes by Turkish politicans; I collect small, intimate bits of information, and re-contextualize them in larger discourses. This transformation of particular, evanescent stories into public, enduring narratives is a constant in my work; the subject matter varies.Featured Work
Photos
Featured Work: Photos
“Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)” - Caryatid Performance
Performance in installation, with objects.
2019
Still from Caryatid performance in Sera Boeno's exhibition "Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)" starring Molly Margulies, Jamiee Shim, Sheya Isabelle Jabouin, Lindsay Chestnut, Rex (Alexandra) Delafkaran and Sheba Newman-Blount. In this forty-five minute-long endurance performance, six female identifying performers will put themselves on vulnerable display while wearing bronze ornaments of domination and torture that are embellished with delicate patterning found in Turkish illuminated manuscripts and textiles. Taking choreographic cues from the contra-posto stance of the six female "pillars" that form the Caryatid Porch at the Erechtheion, the performers will transition from object to subject through gaze and subtle shifts in pose.The performance in "Words Naked / Are Not Enough" calls into question ideas of authority and subjecthood, and the gaze's role in female subjugation, domination and power.
Ornament X: Manual Breast Pumps with Rumî Motifs
Bronze
2019
Artist Sera Boeno culminates six years of artistic exploration about gender-related power struggles in “Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)”. Using her native Turkey as inspiration, the focal point of Boeno’s exhibition is a sculptural installation adapted from the altar of Pergamon, a masterpiece of Hellenistic architecture excavated from Bergama in the Ottoman Empire (Izmir in current day Turkey) and currently held by the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. Emblazoned with quotes from Turkish media about women, Boeno’s monument serves as a stage for female performers wearing bronze ornaments of domination and torture that are embellished with delicate patterning found in Turkish illuminated manuscripts and textiles. By casting her performers as literal “pillars” of a monument dedicated to female subjugation, Boeno considers the myriad ways in which power dynamics are made manifest, whether through the essentialization of the East by the global West, or through the silencing and omission of women from representation; a story that is neither new, nor one that is exclusive to Turkey.
Ornament XII: Scold’s Bridle with Palm Crown
Bronze
2019
Artist Sera Boeno culminates six years of artistic exploration about gender-related power struggles in “Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)”. Using her native Turkey as inspiration, the focal point of Boeno’s exhibition is a sculptural installation adapted from the altar of Pergamon, a masterpiece of Hellenistic architecture excavated from Bergama in the Ottoman Empire (Izmir in current day Turkey) and currently held by the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. Emblazoned with quotes from Turkish media about women, Boeno’s monument serves as a stage for female performers wearing bronze ornaments of domination and torture that are embellished with delicate patterning found in Turkish illuminated manuscripts and textiles. By casting her performers as literal “pillars” of a monument dedicated to female subjugation, Boeno considers the myriad ways in which power dynamics are made manifest, whether through the essentialization of the East by the global West, or through the silencing and omission of women from representation; a story that is neither new, nor one that is exclusive to Turkey.
Ornament XIII: Heretic’s Fork with Rumî Motifs
Bronze
2019
Artist Sera Boeno culminates six years of artistic exploration about gender-related power struggles in “Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)”. Using her native Turkey as inspiration, the focal point of Boeno’s exhibition is a sculptural installation adapted from the altar of Pergamon, a masterpiece of Hellenistic architecture excavated from Bergama in the Ottoman Empire (Izmir in current day Turkey) and currently held by the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. Emblazoned with quotes from Turkish media about women, Boeno’s monument serves as a stage for female performers wearing bronze ornaments of domination and torture that are embellished with delicate patterning found in Turkish illuminated manuscripts and textiles. By casting her performers as literal “pillars” of a monument dedicated to female subjugation, Boeno considers the myriad ways in which power dynamics are made manifest, whether through the essentialization of the East by the global West, or through the silencing and omission of women from representation; a story that is neither new, nor one that is exclusive to Turkey.
Ornament XI: Scold’s Bridle with Hataîs, Tulips and Wild Flower Motifs
Bronze
2019
Artist Sera Boeno culminates six years of artistic exploration about gender-related power struggles in “Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)”. Using her native Turkey as inspiration, the focal point of Boeno’s exhibition is a sculptural installation adapted from the altar of Pergamon, a masterpiece of Hellenistic architecture excavated from Bergama in the Ottoman Empire (Izmir in current day Turkey) and currently held by the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. Emblazoned with quotes from Turkish media about women, Boeno’s monument serves as a stage for female performers wearing bronze ornaments of domination and torture that are embellished with delicate patterning found in Turkish illuminated manuscripts and textiles. By casting her performers as literal “pillars” of a monument dedicated to female subjugation, Boeno considers the myriad ways in which power dynamics are made manifest, whether through the essentialization of the East by the global West, or through the silencing and omission of women from representation; a story that is neither new, nor one that is exclusive to Turkey.
Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough); Monument VI, Ornaments VIII-XIII
Installation (Concrete, bronze)
2019
Artist Sera Boeno culminates six years of artistic exploration about gender-related power struggles in “Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (:Words Naked/Are Not Enough)”. Using her native Turkey as inspiration, the focal point of Boeno’s exhibition is a sculptural installation adapted from the altar of Pergamon, a masterpiece of Hellenistic architecture excavated from Bergama in the Ottoman Empire (Izmir in current day Turkey) and currently held by the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. Emblazoned with quotes from Turkish media about women, Boeno’s monument serves as a stage for female performers wearing bronze ornaments of domination and torture that are embellished with delicate patterning found in Turkish illuminated manuscripts and textiles. By casting her performers as literal “pillars” of a monument dedicated to female subjugation, Boeno considers the myriad ways in which power dynamics are made manifest, whether through the essentialization of the East by the global West, or through the silencing and omission of women from representation; a story that is neither new, nor one that is exclusive to Turkey.