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5th Istanbul Design Biennial

Empathy Revisited: Designs for more than one

October 15 - November 15, 2020

Pera Museum hosted the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial, organized by Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV). For the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial, organised with the support of Republic of Turkey Ministry of Culture and Tourism and under the sponsorship of VitrA, curator Mariana Pestana teamed up with Sumitra Upham (Curator of Programmes) and Billie Muraben (Assistant Curator & Deputy Editor).

Today, we understand empathy to be a way of connecting with other people. But empathy’s original meaning encompassed the transference of feelings into objects and the natural world. The 5th Istanbul Design Biennial took empathy back to its roots to explore how design might equip us to feel into territories, landscapes, microorganisms, other species, and also one another.

With the aim of carving out a space of responsibility and developing a culture of attachment towards the more-than-human, this Biennial put forward a proposition: designs for more than one. Working collaboratively with designers, artists, architects, activists and thinkers, the biennial explored designs for multiple bodies, dimensions, and perspectives. The projects that the biennial presented encourage us to rethink practices of care and civility at this critical moment in time, and to collectively build new systems and structures for re-connecting.

Pera Museum hosted a part of the biennial’s generative programme comprising three main axes: two projects from the series of interventions titled New Civic Rituals, and a video series titled Critical Cooking Show. Kyriaki Goni’s Networks of Trust and the design studio The Rodina’s Map of Empathic Society could be experienced on the collection floors as part of the series of interventions titled New Civic Rituals. A parallel film program titled Empathy Sessions could be watched at the auditorium.

Top image
Hammam, Jawa El Khash

Right Hand Images
object*oriented*magic, Ayşenaz Toker and Merve Tuna
The Map of Empathic Society, The Rodina
Mush Rooms, BUREAU (Daniel Zamarbide) with Chef Walter El Nagar with Filipe Felizardo

Video

Empathy Sessions
5th Istanbul Design Biennial

Presented in the scope of the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial, which is organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts, Empathy Sessions is a selection of film works that expand the notion of empathy.


Pera Learning

Learning Programs for Kids
5th Istanbul Design Biennial

Pera Museum’s Learning Programs and İKSV Alt Kat are hosting, in parallel to the 5th Istanbul Design Biennial organized by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV), colorful online workshops for school groups and ages of 7-12 from October 20th through November 14th, 2020.

Paula Rego in Istanbul!

Paula Rego in Istanbul!

We, by which I mean some of my classmates and I, knew about Paula Rego. I’ll have to admit, I didn’t know where Rego was from or even where in Europe Portugal was. I thought she was English. Let me tell you how I first heard the very un-English sounding name “Paula Rego”

A Night at Pera Museum

A Night at Pera Museum

Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, Pera Museum invites artist Benoît Hamet to reinterpret key pieces from its collections, casting a humorous eye over ‘historical’ events, both imagined and factual.

At the Order of the Padishah

At the Order of the Padishah

In this piece, Żmurko presents an exotic image of a harem chamber, replete with gleaming fabrics and scattered jewels, as a setting for the statuesquely beautiful body of an odalisque murdered “at the order of the padishah”.