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Bilgé Friedlaender (Turkey/US, 1934 - 2000) : Works on Paper, Books, Installations

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  • Bilgé Friedlaender (Turkey/US, 1934 - 2000) 

    Works on Paper, Books, Installations

  • Bilgé: Lifespan of a Horizontal Line Works from the 1970s
    Bilgé: Lifespan of a Horizontal Line Works from the 1970s
    Sapar Contemporary is delighted to present a solo exhibition of Bilgé Friedlaender (1934–2000) in New York City, curated by Isin Önol. The exhibition, titled “Bilgé: Lifespan of a Horizontal Line” is a collaboration with the artist’s estate, and is focused on rare and previously unseen works on paper from the 1970s. The exhibition features a selection highlighting a key period in Bilgé’s oeuvre. The works illustrate the artist’s elaborate visual vocabulary, manifested in her minimalist, sensual, mathematically defined, and yet dimensionality-expanding approach. Through floating squares and poetically ambivalent lines, in superimpositions of fractal paper tears and painted illusions, by contrasting blacks on black and by sculpting shadows of white, Bilgé takes us on an experiential, philosophical journey through her soulful universe.
    • Bilge Friedlaender Tides Time II, 1975 9 1/8 x 12 1/8 x 5/8 in 23.2 x 30.8 x 1.6 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Tides Time II, 1975
      9 1/8 x 12 1/8 x 5/8 in
      23.2 x 30.8 x 1.6 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Tides Time, 1975 12 1/8 x 16 1/8 x 7/8 in 30.8 x 41 x 2.2 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Tides Time, 1975
      12 1/8 x 16 1/8 x 7/8 in
      30.8 x 41 x 2.2 cm
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  • Bilgé immigrated from her native Turkey to New York in 1958. After early solo shows in the 1970s at Betty Parsons and Kornblee Galleries in New York City, her work was featured internationally throughout the 1980s and 90s, at the Istanbul Biennial, the Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, Corcoran Museum, Washington D.C. Bilge spent the majority of her career in the U.S. and exhibited alongside many including Robert Rauschenberg and Michelle Stewart. In recent years, Bilge’s work received an increasing institutional and scholarly attention through carefully curated exhibitions at Arter, Istanbul, Neues Museum, Nürnberg, and Istanbul Modern. These exhibitions place Bilge in a distinctly female lineage of abstraction that goes back to the pioneers of this movement. She drew her inspiration from and dialogued with her contemporaries, among them Robert Motherwell, Georgia OKeefe, Eva Hess, and Agnes Martin. Other rich Eastern and Western influences that can be traced in her work are Turkish modern poets, Sufi mystics, sacred numerology, as well as Dada  and 19th-century American poets and writers.
    • Bilge Friedlaender Androsia, 1975 Watercolor, pencil, Fabriano paper 22 x 30 in 55.88 x 76.2 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Androsia, 1975
      Watercolor, pencil, Fabriano paper
      22 x 30 in
      55.88 x 76.2 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Weightless Pink, 1975 Watercolor, pencil, Fabriano paper 22 x 30 in 55.9 x 76.2 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Weightless Pink, 1975
      Watercolor, pencil, Fabriano paper
      22 x 30 in
      55.9 x 76.2 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Line: Wareham, 1975 Watercolor, pencil, string on Fabriano paper 22 x 30 in 55.9 x 76.2 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Line: Wareham, 1975
      Watercolor, pencil, string on Fabriano paper
      22 x 30 in
      55.9 x 76.2 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Line Mutation #4, 1974 String, pencil, watercolor on Fabriano paper 23 x 31 in 58.4 x 78.7 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Line Mutation #4, 1974
      String, pencil, watercolor on Fabriano paper
      23 x 31 in
      58.4 x 78.7 cm
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    • Bilge Friedlaender Horizontal Life Span Series (with rectangle), 1974 Pastel, pencil on Strathmore paper 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.53 x 64.77 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Horizontal Life Span Series (with rectangle), 1974
      Pastel, pencil on Strathmore paper
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.53 x 64.77 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Horizontal Line Life Span Series 5, 1974 Pastel, pencil on Strathmore paper 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.5 x 64.8 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Horizontal Line Life Span Series 5, 1974
      Pastel, pencil on Strathmore paper
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.5 x 64.8 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Untitled (mutated square with torn note), 1976 Torn pencil, paper, watercolor, Strathmore paper 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.5 x 64.8 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Untitled (mutated square with torn note), 1976
      Torn pencil, paper, watercolor, Strathmore paper
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.5 x 64.8 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Untitled (mutated square with torn pink), 1976 Torn watercolor, pencil, Strathmore paper 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.5 x 64.8 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Untitled (mutated square with torn pink), 1976
      Torn watercolor, pencil, Strathmore paper
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.5 x 64.8 cm
    Close
  • Bilge Friedlaender, Untitled (2/4/1976), 1976 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Horizontal Line Life Span (torn), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Horizontal Line Life Span Series (white with black), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Untitled (2/4/1976), 1976
    • Bilge Friedlaender Untitled (Cosmos Pastel I), 1975 Pastel, pencil 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.5 x 64.8 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Untitled (Cosmos Pastel I), 1975
      Pastel, pencil
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.5 x 64.8 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Untitled (Cosmos Pastel II), 1975 Pastel, pencil on paper 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.5 x 64.8 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Untitled (Cosmos Pastel II), 1975
      Pastel, pencil on paper
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.5 x 64.8 cm
    Close
  • About Artist

    Bilge Friedlaender (1934 - 2000) was a Turkish-American artist who extensively explored sensual, spiritual connections through her artistic engagement with geometric abstraction. In her long and prolific career, her exploration developed through her expressive minimalist visual language. In Friedlaender journals, she spoke of the universal human creations of the “line,” the “square,” and how they embody the human relationship to nature.  Bilge’s career launched with solo exhibitions of minimalist works in 1974 at Betty Parsons and Kornblee Galleries in New York. At the time she took inspiration from the work of Robert Motherwell, Georgia OKeefe, Eva Hess, Agnes Martin. Across her productive years her art was informed by the writing of Emily Dickenson, Nazim Hikmet, Virginia Woolf and Rumi.  Friedlaender’s  transformative experiences in nature and with early earthworks set the stage for her later ecological works in the 1980s; making interventions in nature, and working directly with natural materials. She was part of New American Paperworks and exhibited alongside Robert Rauschenberg, Michelle Stewart and many others. She continued to exhibit internationally through the 1990s with works centering on awakening the human consciousness to our interdependencey with nature through exploration of ritual and the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh from an Feminist  Jungian position.  Exhibition venues included; Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the Second International Istanbul Biennial, Gallery Nev, Istanbul, American Craft Museum, NY, Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, University of Massachusetts Museum at Amherst, Corcoran Museum, Washington D.C., Arter, Istanbul, Neues Museum, Nürenberg.

    • Bilge Friedlaender Untitled (2 black mutated squares), 1976 Charcoal, pastel, pencil, Arches paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.77 x 49.53 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Untitled (2 black mutated squares), 1976
      Charcoal, pastel, pencil, Arches paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.77 x 49.53 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Untitled (line mutation with black sq + white corner), 1975 Charcoal, pencil, Arches paper 19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in 49.53 x 64.77 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Untitled (line mutation with black sq + white corner), 1975
      Charcoal, pencil, Arches paper
      19 1/2 x 25 1/2 in
      49.53 x 64.77 cm
    Close
  • Bilge Friedlaender, Horizontal Line Life Span Series 6, 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Line Plus Time Plus Torn #2, 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Untitled (mutated square with tear II), 1976 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Line + Time + Torn #3, 1976 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Horizontal Line Life Span Series 6, 1975
  • Installations

    Beeswax, muslin, paint, string  60 x 129 in 152.4 x 327.7 cm (View more details about this item in a popup).
    (View more details about this item in a popup).
    (View more details about this item in a popup).
    (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender
    Homage to Emily Dickenson Quadriptic, 1977
  • Bilge Friedlaender, WORDS NUMBERS LINE EDITION, 1977 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, WORDS NUMBERS LINE EDITION, 1977 (detail) (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, WORDS NUMBERS LINE EDITION, 1977 (detail) (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Victoria - A Book of Water, 1978 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Victoria - A Book of Water, 1978 (detail) (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Victoria - A Book of Water, 1978 (detail) (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, A Swimming Heart Book, 1977 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, A Swimming Heart Book, 1977 (detail) (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, A Swimming Heart Book, 1977 (detail) (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, WORDS NUMBERS LINE EDITION, 1977
  • Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (White Center), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black with Yellow), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (blue), 1975 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (blue), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (blue), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender,Sky Pastel (White Center) Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender,Sky Pastel (White Center), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black & White Lines), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black with Yellow), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black with Yellow), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (Black with Yellow), Detail (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Bilge Friedlaender, Sky Pastel (White Center), 1975
  • About Curator

    Isin Önol is a curator based in New York and Vienna Before that, she led the Elgiz Museum of Contemporary Art Istanbul as its director and curator. (2006-2009). Her curatorial research focuses on interconnecting archival information with oral histories to create platforms for collective memory through collaborative art practices. She is a research scholar at the Center for the Study of Social Difference, Columbia University since 2014. She has been appointed as a guest professor and curator at University of Applied Arts, Vienna Austria for 2021-2023. She served as a lecturer at Montclair State University, Department of Art & Design for five years. Önol co-founded and directs the Nesin Art Village, an independent art school in Turkey. Önol holds an MFA from Sabanci University, Istanbul, a MAS from Zürich University of the Arts, and is a PhD candidate at the University of Applied Arts, Vienna. Isin Önol has been elected twice among the Board of Directors of Roberto Cimetta Fund for the period 2018-2021 and 2021-2024.

    Isin Önol co-curated Bilge Friedlaender's first posthumous solo exhibition at Arter, Istanbul, together with Mira Friedlaender in 2016. Her recent exhibitions include Imagine Repair (New York), A Knot in the Throat: Foraging for Vanishing Present (Vienna), Thinking Food Futures (New York), Women Mobilizing Memory (Istanbul, Vienna, New York, Madrid), and When Home Won’t Let You Stay (Vienna). She was one of the curators of the International Sinop Biennial in 2012, 2014 and 2021. She has produced more than 60 exhibitions internationally, and published on the intersection of social justice and art.

    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #1, 1975 Pastel, pencil on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #1, 1975
      Pastel, pencil on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #2, 1975 Pastel, pencil 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #2, 1975
      Pastel, pencil
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #3, 1975 Pastel, pencil on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #3, 1975
      Pastel, pencil on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #4, 1975 Pastel, pencil on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #4, 1975
      Pastel, pencil on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #5, 1975 Pastel on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #5, 1975
      Pastel on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #6, 1975 Pastel on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #6, 1975
      Pastel on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #7, 1975 Pastel, pencil on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #7, 1975
      Pastel, pencil on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
    • Bilge Friedlaender Corn Hill #8, 1975 Pastel, pencil on paper 25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in 64.8 x 49.5 cm
      Bilge Friedlaender
      Corn Hill #8, 1975
      Pastel, pencil on paper
      25 1/2 x 19 1/2 in
      64.8 x 49.5 cm
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