DO ALL ROADS REALLY LEAD TO ROME?

Yes, I first visited Rome in 1968. And now, in 2025, I’ve had the opportunity to return, this time, not just to see the city, but to be part of something meaningful.

I want to talk about artist Ahmet Güneştekin’s solo exhibition at GNAMC, the National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rome. While his major show at ArtIstanbul Feshane continues, and preparations for the opening of a grand art palace in Venice are underway, Güneştekin has also opened this exhibition in Rome and donated two works to the museum.

In an interview with curators Paola Marino and Sergio Risaliti, it was noted that the exhibition, titled Never There (Eravate Assenti in Italian), opens at a time when armed and political conflicts are shaking civilization, leaving behind pain and destruction. The show was realized through the ongoing dedication of many, under the curatorial direction of Marino and Risaliti, with Angelo Bucarelli as project coordinator and Renata Cristina Mazzantini as museum director.

Ahmet Güneştekin offers a response to the fragile and tense moment we are living in, using the tools and language of art.

Controversy was not absent in Italy either. According to Artribune, one of the works on display at the museum in Rome reportedly caused discomfort among some security staff, prompting a union-led request for its removal. This led to an official demand for a review of the “harmful” artworks in the exhibition and for the mandatory use of protective masks.

The exhibition was brought to life under the curatorial direction of Paola Marino and Sergio Risaliti, who have followed the artist’s work for over 15 years, with Angelo Bucarelli overseeing project coordination and support from Mehmet Tanketin, who has accompanied the artist on his international journey.

The project was conceived following a meeting with museum director Renata Cristina Mazzantini, while a major exhibition at ArtIstanbul Feshane was ongoing and preparations continued for the opening of a grand art palace in Venice, planned for 2026.

Ahmet Güneştekin responds to the crises and social issues of this politically fragile and tense period using the tools and language of art.

(Artribune reported again: “A work on display at the museum in Rome was requested to be removed due to discomfort it reportedly caused among security staff, according to union statements. This led to a formal request for the evaluation of ‘harmful’ works and for mandatory mask usage within the exhibition space.”)

Now let’s take a look at how Ahmet felt in the face of this controversy: “I was born into tension, raised in it, and I still live in it. There were some beautiful periods in life when we felt a kind of economic or cultural freedom, but they were short-lived, and anxiety quickly returned. We were much happier as children. As we grew older, the problems grew too. The one thing I want most in life is peace. But how can you turn your back on the tragedies of history? I can’t. I am still the most recognized Turkish artist living in Turkiye on the international stage. I could have chosen a quieter life, but I feel I must be brave and stay true to my path.

There was trouble here in Rome as well. The removal of my work Picco di Memoria (Reminiscence Bump) was the greatest disappointment of my life. Italy, the birthplace of the Renaissance, is filled with art. Every time I walk your streets, I almost get a stiff neck from looking up at all the works. Until this happened, I always felt free in Italy. I used to say, ‘This people has managed to preserve such a legacy.’”

“Picco di Memoria (Reminiscence Bump) has been exhibited five times before. No one objected. No one wore masks. The scent that sparked the controversy? It’s the scent of the working class. The shoes I wore until I was fourteen. The shoes my parents wore until the day they died… I didn’t bring pretty postcards to Rome. I brought the reality of our daily lives. The truth of modest, poor, marginalized people. Visit rural Italy, you’ll still see people wearing rubber boots.”

“My principle is this: art should heal, repair, wrap around disasters and evil, and give the soul a way out.”

“Art is not just a painting hung on a wall or a beautiful sculpture. It’s the 21st century, and the artist is someone who expresses their vision using everything history offers. If a work of art wants to say something, sometimes it must disturb, shake you, pull you out of your comfort zone. I try to mend what’s broken and leave a note for the future. The strongest aspect of this work is its scent. That scent is meant to disturb, to hit like a hammer, otherwise, people won’t notice.”

“I also use different forms of expression because I believe a work of art can speak to all five senses. When Jannis Kounellis presented twelve live horses at Fabio Sargentini’s L’Attico gallery, no one complained about the smell, the animals, or their mess. That’s why now, you may better understand why what happened in Rome hurt me so deeply.”

“As a solution, I censored myself. I used about fifty transparent, airtight bags to trap the scent and arranged them in a circular form, evoking sunlight. And in the open space, I placed a small child’s shoe. Gaza.

My aim was to make absence visible. The idea of absence, which had been chosen long before any of this happened, was already embedded in the title of the exhibition.”

“Yes, absence. And I hung photographs on the walls that served as a kind of ‘memory of memory.’ I want to thank everyone who, even indirectly, gave me the opportunity to create a new work of art through this crisis.”

Every exhibition calls for discovering its curatorial approach. I try to uncover this in every GOYA art experience I have. I even try to observe the dynamic, sometimes the tension, between the artist, the artwork, and the curator. Here is how our curator approached this exhibition:

“The exhibition is structured in five sections. We tried to make the artist’s different formal and narrative choices visible within a context filled with masterpieces. There is a kind of connective work, almost like the artist’s spine, linking the small room at the entrance where the doors are displayed with the central main hall. In that hall, there is a symphonic echo between Canova’s Hercules and Lichas sculpture and the large three-dimensional wall piece Never There behind it. This creates a very strong dialogue between the ancient and the contemporary, forming a dramatic connection of universal significance. It shows us the irrational and unrestrained outburst of violence we witness through the innocent corpses left behind, the destruction, ruins, and disasters.”

“At the end of this section, there are three paintings. One is a large, magnificent red door. Another is a painting dominated by acidic green tones. And the third is an allegorical painting connected to ancient coins that depict mythological gods and heroes.”

“The final section on the other wing of the museum is the ‘Hall of Wars.’ During his initial site visit, Güneştekin immediately stated that, seen from today’s perspective, the victims in every conflict are the poor, the oppressed, and the innocent.”

“We believe that artists, even if through different poetic approaches, are always witnesses to their era. Some artists bear witness directly and make an accusation through their works. They revolt against violent deaths, the tyranny of power, oppression, and restrictions on freedom and rights. There are historical examples like Michelangelo, Rubens, Goya, Géricault, and Courbet. And of course, Picasso’s Guernica is a turning point in this tradition. Let us remember his response when Nazi officials visited his studio and asked, ‘Did you do this?’ He said, ‘You did.’”

Now, if I may, I would like to share my own reflections:

First of all, I deeply appreciate that Güneştekin uses his name in its original Turkish spelling internationally, including the unique characters ‘Ü’ and ‘Ş’ that are so distinctive to our language.

The work that gave me particular pride was Il drago di Fatih il Conquistatore (The Dragon of Mehmed the Conqueror). To me, the fact that a painting depicting the fall of Eastern Rome is being exhibited in Rome carries immense symbolic weight.

As for the smell of rubber shoes, I must admit I was disheartened by the way some Europeans instrumentalize concerns like health and the environment to justify their self-centered attitudes.

Among Güneştekin’s works, the theme of migration has always affected me most deeply, even painfully. For families like ours who have been uprooted, displaced from their homes, this is something we understand all too well. My grandfather İslam came to Istanbul to study, supported by a scholarship from Sultan Abdulhamid II, and attended the Fatih Madrasas. He later married my grandmother in Thrace, where he had been assigned. But during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78, when Russian forces advanced all the way to Ayastefanos, they fled in desperation, barefoot and with nothing, ahead of the enemy army, eventually seeking refuge in the courtyard of a mosque in Istanbul. I had often heard the tragic stories of their exile that began when, in an attempt to save her child’s life, my grandmother entrusted her baby daughter (my aunt) to a passing ox cart, only to be reunited with her by sheer luck. A young mother, she lost both her child and her home, and walked hundreds of kilometers barefoot to reach safety. On that journey, even the rubber shoes, if they had any, were swallowed by the mud. They didn’t even have a pair of shoes that symbolized poverty itself.

Note on the Removal of the Artwork from the Gallery

Letter from Museum Staff Regarding the Removal of Ahmet Güneştekin’s Reminiscence Bump

“A critical situation has emerged at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Rome following the installation of certain works for an upcoming contemporary art exhibition.” These words are taken from a letter written by union representatives, requesting the removal of Ahmet Güneştekin’s Reminiscence Bump (Picco di Memoria) from the exhibition space. “The artwork in question emits a strong and disturbing odor, making it unbearable to remain in Gallery 2 and the surrounding areas. Staff assigned to monitor these sections have reported headaches and nausea.”

In contemporary art history, works involving loud sounds, intense lights, and strong smells are quite common. If you work as a security guard in a museum, this is part of the job. However, if the unions at GNAM (Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna) are already expressing concerns about extended hours for evening openings, it would be unrealistic to expect them to tolerate an unusual smell. In the end, the discomfort led Turkish artist Ahmet Güneştekin to reconsider the layout of the Never There exhibition and to present this emotionally and visually powerful installation in a different way.

About Reminiscence Bump, which was displayed in the “Hall of Wars” at the National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art (GNAMC) in Rome, Güneştekin says:

“When I first visited the gallery in Rome, under the direction of Renata Cristina Mazzantini, the space that struck me most was the Hall of Wars. To me, these images were not postcards of the past, but harsh and dramatic reflections of my own life, my family, and my people. At that moment, I knew I had to exhibit Reminiscence Bump there. This installation is nourished by labor, violence, and genocide. It consists of hundreds of shoes worn by the poor, by women, the elderly, children, and workers. Behind all this suffering lie tragedies that have always targeted the weak, the innocent, and the dissenters. The work emits a strong, sharp, and disturbing odor. Poverty and death do not smell pleasant—believe me. Neither exile, nor prison, nor massacres smell good. But clearly, outside of certain contexts, even the most horrific realities have become nothing more than virtual spectacles. That is not the case with us. In our world, they still have a smell—powerful, jarring, unforgettable. After completing the installation of Reminiscence Bump, I learned that some museum staff had expressed discomfort about the smell and had submitted their concerns to management through union channels. I respect that.”

“I have exhibited this installation in other venues and never encountered a problem or censorship. I also have certifications proving that the work does not violate any health regulations. Still, out of respect for both the management and the staff, I decided to remove the piece. This situation showed me something: Reminiscence Bump can live a second life. As always throughout history, the artist responds with creativity and generosity. Starting Tuesday, visitors will see previously unseen photographic works that ‘crystallize’ the memory of this installation. Because that initial inspiration and testimony should never be forgotten or erased from history.”