Nuri İyem (1915 - 2005)
"Migrant Woman"
Details Faces: Starting from 1962 the delicacy of portrait paintings which has started with the exhibition “Liman” will be evolving to multiple. Works on woman faces in İyem’s art. The canvasses which are being ruled by oval faces, with a white or a enframing black cover, or sometimes hair with a similar mission, are being illustrated as a different examples of this grouping with the delicacy of Nuri İyem. From Anger to patience, love to hatred, inevitability to desperation, darkness to love but most importantly the eyes which are burning with lights which are leaning from discrete rebellions to shocking screams are dominant in İyem’s expression. The monumentalized faces are being shaked with the emotions that the glance has been reflecting. Sometimes the lips are opening with the painful scream of rebellion, from the faces which are monumentalizing the patience of hundred years. These paintings are the interpretations which are being filtered by his process of abstraction and artistic expression. This subjective abstraction is the base of the structure of composition. While the values which are defining the personalities are becoming to portraits, the shapes and objects which are completely purified by the details, are opening to symbolic investigations. The fabrics and hair by covering the heads are emframing the faces as the balances of stains to make the skin textures visible. All the mimics and drawings which are creating a meaning in the faces are being carefully selected. The lips and noses which were minimized to simple forms are reinforcing the frozen effect of sculptural faces. The eyes were kept to reflect the individualism and personality and being revealed as a spectacular visuality. The eyes which are creating portraits from these sculptural faces and even revealing it’s owner’s whole life.
Kıymet Giray, “Nuri İyem”, İş Bankası Kültür Publications, 1998, Page: 147, 150
Oil on canvas
65 x 60 cm
1996, signed
Estimate: 700.000 TL - 900.000 TL
Starting Bid: 500,000 TL
