Nazif Topcuoglu
Nazif Topçuoğlu is a Turkish photographer who was (born in 1953) in Ankara, Turkey.
Education
Born in 1953, Nazif Topçuoğlu graduated with a Masters degree from the Institute of Design in Chicago in 1981. Since then he has exhibited worldwide and has published 3 books on the history and criticism of photography. His work appears regularly at art fairs such as Paris Photo (2006-2009), ARCO (2008 & 2009), Scope Basel (2008) among others and at auctions, most recently in the Christies Dubai sale in April 2009, the Sotheby’s Turkish Contemporary Art auction in March 2009 and Phillips De Pury’s Now: Art of the 21st Century in September 2009. His work is included in several significant publications on contemporary art including Vitamin Ph: New Perspectives in Photography, published by Phaidon in 2006 and User’s Manual: Contemporary Art in Turkey 1986-2006, published by art-ist in 2007. He will also be included in the upcoming publication entitled “Unleashed: Contemporary Art from Turkey” to be published by Transglobe Publishing in spring 2010.
Work
Nazif Topçuoğlu works in the domain of constructed, staged photography, where everything is controlled. Rather than capture actual events, Nazif tends to create controlled events in which he allows small accidents to happen. Over the years, he has created a consistent body of work that predominantly features young girls set in period backdrops and engaged in a variety of symbolic actions and roles. Nazif’s photographs are almost akin to painting in their rich colour and detail, while also resembling stills from a theatre play. The underlying thread in his work is a constant preoccupation with time, memory and loss. He worries about the transience of people and ideals, and tries to reconstruct unclear and imperfect images of an idealized past. Hence his constant art-historical references to classical paintings and photographs such as Rembrandt and Caravaggio as well as to authors like Marcel Proust, Thomas Mann, Vladimir Nabokov and Lewis Carrol, are an attempt to recapture the past. Despite the old-fashioned mise-en-scene, however, the subtexts in Nazif’s work remains remains purely contemporary. There is often a characteristic duality in his work; hovering between innocence and experience, passivity and aggression, masculinity and femininity.
Solo & Group Exhibitions (2003-2009)
2009 “Consolation”, Green Art Gallery, Dubai, UAE (solo) 2009 "A Subjective Panorama of Contemporary Turkish Photography", Maison De Metallos, Paris, France 2009 Solo Project/Flatland Gallery, Basel, Switzerland 2008 “Viva Lolita”, Maddox Gallery, London, UK 2008 “Lamentations”, Flatland Gallery, Netherlands (solo) 2007 NEV/TEPEBAŞI, Galerie Nev, Istanbul, Turkey 2007 Nooderlicht Festival, Netherlands 2006 Solo Exhibition, Palma 12, Barcelona, Spain 2006 PRO 2006 European Reflections, Charlottenborg, Copenhagen, Denmark 2006 Russian Biennale of Photography, Moscow, Russia 2006 “Rendez-vous avec une femme”, Galerie Bertin-Toublanc, Paris, France 2006 Solo Exhibition, Flatland Gallery, Netherlands 2006 “New Things”, Galerie Nev, Istanbul, Turkey (solo) 2005 Solo exhibition, Kunstraum-Syltquelle, Sylt, Germany 2004 “ZKM Call Me Istanbul” , Karlsruhe , Germany 2004 “Greece-Turkey, Meeting Point”, Leverkusen, Germany 2003 Venice Biennale Turkish Pavilion, Venice, Italy 2003 Group exhibition, Galerie Susanne Hojriis, Copenhagen 2003 Galerie Nev, Istanbul, Turkey (solo)
Collections
JPMorgan-Chase, USA Marion and Guy Naggar, London, UK Schürmann, Germany Sema and Barbaros Çağa, Istanbul Fotocollectie Hoboken Erasmus University Rotterdam, Netherlands Reflex Miniature Museum of Contemporary Art, Amsterdam, Netherlands