As a parallel activity to the 8th Istanbul Biennial, Gallery Apel organized an exhibition entitled “Bağ; poet’s garden”, a phrase taken from a Turkish-English dictionary*Invited artists have produced their independent works within this frame of theme for the exhibition, which is a continuation of the series of exhibits starting with “La Strada” (1999) and followed by “Harvest” (2001).“Bağ” is a Turkish word which has more than one meaning.

The first meaning that comes to mind is “vineyard”, the second common would be tie, ties, connection, devotion etc. While working on the concept we came across another meaning that perhaps ties all the other definitions together: “poet’s garden!”. Even just a moment of visualizing a vineyard, zooming to the grapevine, the element of this garden, can lead us to numerous sensations. How does this marvelous plant grow? How does it maintain itself? What has it been offering the world? We will not get into details, derivations, metaphors neigther historical nor metaphysical here. In fact we are more interested in the interpretations of the artists of today.In this exhibition we will be able to share the views of nine artists who have used various expressive media ranging from real grass to poetry from lights to barbed wire in their installations. The contributing artists are Canan Dağdelen, Sakine Çil, Güler Güngör, Selma Gürbüz Balkan Naci İslimyeli, Hasan Bülent Kahraman, Kurucu Koçanoğlu, Tuğrul Selçuk, Yıldız Şermet.* New Redhouse Sözlüğü, Türkce-İngilizce Sözlük, Redhouse Yayınevi, 1.Baskı, 1968, İstanbul, sayfa:119.