Fallen Monuments
part 1:
hold your bread!
Monuments commemorate events, figures, or social phenomena, but this remembrance is less about the past and more about the future. They resist what is to come, define space, and rely on durable materials to endure.
This project shifts focus to the moment itself, the instant worth remembering. In Fallen Monuments, materials are chosen so that when the moment ends, the monument disappears. Nothing remains. These are monuments designed to vanish, embodying fate in material form.
Today, we no longer need singular references such as grand ideas, heroic figures, or fixed ideologies. What we have are fragments, stories, and poems. I do not believe in figures or events that must be commemorated by all. Yet this is not a break from the past; rather, any moment I witness and take part in feels more revealing than dominant narratives or imposed heroism. I honor those devoted to light, but I believe public space belongs to the living.
So this project is not about loss, but the hope that emerges from it. It asks how matter, through its own mortality, can create an encounter. My answer is by inscribing a bold poem into space.
That is how Fallen Monuments began.
Bread, the most fundamental food of these lands, holds another deep significance. A body filled with bread just to sustain itself, a life lived merely to be nourished—bread, which should never be on the ground, falling to the earth signifies the fall of humanity itself. The idea that humans are not even as valuable as the things they create, and therefore remain fragile, is symbolized by the fall of bread, the most sacred and essential food of these lands.
In five different districts of Istanbul, bread loaves shaped from the body molds of five different people were placed. These bread bodies were part of a process exploring the performance of an object—they were created to disappear, and the way they vanished was determined by the memory and social dynamics of the district where they were placed.
Production Process
Plaster molds were taken from five people, bread dough was placed inside these molds, and then baked. Later, these separate body parts were assembled.
Installation
Process
These bodies were placed in public squares by two people. As soon as they placed them, they left the area—ensuring that people wouldn’t find someone to question directly. Shortly after, team members blended into the crowd as random passersby, engaging in conversations and recording audio. Meanwhile, others from the team filmed the scene from a distance.
