Mehmet Ali Uysal and Irfan Onurmen: + Infinity

Instead of art movements that precede one another, the life and works of genius artists or iconic masterpieces, + Infinity suggests reading the history of art through collectors.

Personal collections are excellent laboratories for observing the world of art before, during and after the time of their initiation. Directed especially by gallery owners and art dealers, the curiosity and the means of passionate art lovers not only determine the contemporary state of art, but also its history, economy and politics. In a complex system that is entirely speculative, the stars that rise and fall, the values that dramatically fluctuate can be determined by one single collector’s faith or obstinacy. On the other hand, this very same faith and obstinacy may also lose the battle against the system; a name that the collector pursued all through his or her life may afterwards be completely forgotten; an invaluable work that he or she cannot stop gazing at may soon become worthless.

However, when history is read on the basis of a single collection, just as it may enlighten the meta histories and the big systems, it may also render them completely meaningless.

Even if a collector dedicated his or her life to bringing together works of an artist that nobody had or would appreciate, this is still an important gesture. A perspective that places the collector at the centre, aims to discover not only the relationship between the works of art and the world of art, but also the unique relationships between the works themselves.

While trying to discover the secret formula which is known merely to the collector and which changes completely with every new work added or absent, the reflections that will arise by overlaps and comparisons of style, material, colour or generation are infinite.