Ali Ibrahim Öcal has constructed an installation with piled up objects resembling shovels consisting of hundreds of tree branches and metal shovel blades depending on the conditions of the venue or the outdoor space. While each shovel’s blade is real and functional, their handles are not made out of treated and shaped wood but out of branches. All of these handles were found on the forest ground; they are dead branches that have broken off during storms or similar natural phenomena. The fact that they are plentiful and tightly placed in the venue so that they cover the whole area is a reference to the human being questioning its relationship with the soil.

In the installation designed to be exhibited within the scope of artist biennale, a setup based on the functionality of the shovel is suggested. As a matter of fact, the shovel is a straight object used as a tool that is designed and selected in accordance with non-functional human anatomy.

By de nition, everything in nature that was not touched and changed by mankind is called ‘natural factor’. Today there is scarcely anything that has not been subject to human intervention. Hence, what is natural is dying out.

This shovel form, with which the audience is familiar with, creates the following questions: How can this shovel be produced in a crooked form unlike normal shovels, as well as the person who uses this shovel work the soil? While looking at these shovel-like objects in the installation, feeling the oddity and maybe not being able to relate oneself to them, one does not question whether the handle of a real shovel is made out of wood or something else. There is a wild form presented that is different than a tamed shovel handle. But how does a shovel that has gone out of its real de nition and a tree branch come together? Is the shovel non-functional for the individual who has made the transition from the agricultural society to the industrial society? An individual has a fundamental connection with trees and the soil which in most of the cases it is forgotten. But the individual unavoidably reminds himself of this connection by means of getting a houseplant, eating at a wooden table, stepping on wooden oor. But how is one’s relationship with shovels and similar tools that are produced by human beings and used in order to serve them? Did mankind got detached from the soil, from the shovel that is used to get in touch with the soil, from the reality of the connection?

On the other hand, the number of shovels that one can use for any task is one. It is not possible to use more than one shovel simultaneously to gain speed and proceed faster. When the function of a tool is in question, sometimes the quality and not the quantity is important. A person can use a shovel and just try to use the objects in this installation but the branches slow down the act. When the tree that one is familiar with in the form of a branch becomes the handle of a shovel, the user/audience becomes estranged. The shovel is not a shovel but since the branch remainsinitsnaturalformwithouthumaninterventionitcontinuesto be a branch. It is unique. Matchless and unique like the human being who has the capacity to hold it.

The shovel consists of a metal plate at one end and of a dead branch of a tree. As for the handles of the shovels in the installation, they are crooked, ordinary branches which give the clue that they are parts of a tree. Hence, these shovels are to be constructed by means of the installation. The audience is expected to question memorized knowledge and de nitions, as well as its relationship with nature. The spectators should try to establish a relationship with the installation through estrangement and question marks. “Untitled” offers the audience a new proposition on its communication with nature, its relationship with daily life objects and the reality.

BA 1999-2003
BA Fine Arts Painitng, Faculty of Fine Arts, S.Demirel University