ASLI ÇAVUŞOĞLU: Future Tense, 2017
Turkey became an exponentially worse context for journalists with the polarization post-Gezi (2013), causing many to lose their jobs. The 2016 coup led to many newspapers and magazines to close down and many writers and journalists to be imprisoned. The polarization was also reflected in the ways in which the news have been received; choosing to buy a certain newspaper or to follow a specific news portal meant taking a specific side.
Parallel to the increasing censorship and move away from being a state of law, the number of fortune-tellers and astrologers increase. Astrologers and clairvoyants are invited to newscasts, enjoying the position of authority. Most probably the least affected by the oppression and censorship, the fortunetellers have become more politically engaged, warning us about bombs by looking at the angles of the stars, providing us with a date for a rebellion depending on the position of Mars.
Future Tense is a project in the form of a newspaper that brings together 50 soothsayers from diverse political opinions and ethnicities who consulted sand, lead, tarot cards, coffee grounds, blank sheets of A4 paper, dreams, water, clairvoyance, astrology, pendulums and horoscopes in order to reveal the point that Turkey has reached in newscasting. The sessions took place in December 2016 and January 2017. The articles in the newspaper have been commissioned specifically for 2017 and further future.
As populism, lack of empathy, discrimination are reaching new extremes both in the world and in Turkey, as everyone is asking the question of what will happen next, Future Tense questions our habits of receiving the news by mixing propaganda, news, and fortunetelling.
16 pages, Black and White. Commissioned by Pinchuk Art Centre for the exhibition of Future Generation Art Prize 2017.
Future Tense has been edited by Evrim Altug /// designed by Yetkin Basarir /// coordinated by Deniz Memisoglu /// translated from Turkish into English by Merve Unsal /// copy edited by Zeynep Bilginsoy. Conversations by Yusuf Emre Yalçın (Sinop), Asli Cavusoglu (Istanbul + Tekirdag), Deniz Memisoglu (Istanbul), Cengiz Tekin (Diyarbakir), Gulnur Kurap (Edirne), Fikret Atay (Batman), Emel Sikargenc (Hatay), Meliha Cavusoglu (Adapazari + Istanbul), Ayber Hasturk (Adana).