This open-air cinema is located at the edge of the ancient city of Mardin, on a hilltop above the Mesopotamian plain in what is now Turkey. The city’s multi-ethnic population speaks Arabic, Aramaic, Kurdish and Turkish, a mixed heritage under strain due to the ongoing Kurdish-Turkish conflict.
As the result of a British Council initiative, the German artist Clemens von Wedemeyer conceived an art project in 2010 that would forge a new public space for Mardin – providing agora-type seating in the day and an open-air cinema at night. It’s a place for the whole community to come together, if only for the duration of a film.
Wedermeyer’s project fulfills a practical need, as the city’s last screen closed 25 years ago, but it also has a poetic edge. The site is known locally as the “city of light” and contains the remains of an ancient temple to the sun. The polished metal back of Wedemeyer’s six-by-twelve metre screen forms a graphic sculptural element, reflecting the setting sun from its mirrored surface down onto the plains stretching far into Syria below. p (rgw)
Photo: Clemens von Wedemeyer
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