Don’t kill me mevlana
My father gave me Mevlana as a middle name to honour the Persian
Sufi mystic Djalal Ad-din Rumi. Mevlana means «spiritual master».
I am not a spiritual master, I am not Mevlana. My first name, Murat,
echoes the sultanate, the kingdom. I am not a sultan, I am not Murat.
How can I wear my first names without wearing all these memories
that plunge far back in time and echo the political climate of today?
I have the choice to carry this baggage or to leave it at the entrance
of Switzerland, my country of birth and where I grew up, my country
which is not really my country because it showed me voting posters
telling me that I am not welcome here.
Come and discover my path through my artistic proposals where
I will try to discover this cultural heritage in a geographical and
political context that distances itself from it. The path is strewn with
doubts, it fades because of westernization, genocides, heavy silences.
Every Saturday I will search for my inner barbarian by proposing
a performance, a reading-performance or a video in which I
experiment, I imply. I will ask questions to traditional instruments, I
will use words in Turkish that I will transform into spells to give me
answers, I will invoke animals that lived in the land of my ancestors.
Unwittingly, I will orientalize my family members and myself with my
ignorant eyes.
Performance program
Thursday 18.8.22
opening with performance, presentation
of my video Caspian Tiger followed by my
performance Deli kanlı sana kurban olurum
Saturday 20.8.22 performance
Saturday 27.8.22 performance
Saturday 03.9.22 interactive installation
Saturday 10.9.22 interactive installation
Saturday 17.9.22 performance
Thursday 22.9.22
finissage with performance
Murat Mevlana Temel, aka Havasu Kaya,
is an Anatolian-Swiss artist, author and
astrologer whose work is based on writing.
In anecdotes taken from everyday life he
seeks the link between the banal and the
mystical. The writings are rendered in the
form of artistic actions inviting the audience
to engage in public readings or writings.