The project initiated by Maçka Art Gallery in collaboration with its architect Mehmet Konuralp continued in 2022 with architect Ömer Selçuk Baz’s “Forest of Christmas Trees”, in 2023 with architect Hakan Demirel’s “mââile”, and in 2024 with architect Kerem Piker’s “forty-eight”. In 2025, architects Ece Duran and Oğul Öztunç will meet the audience with their exhibition titled “The Table (Sofra)”.

“The New Year symbolizes the re-enactment of cosmogony — a return to the beginning of time, to the purity of the first moment, and to the root of creation. The structure designed for this exhibition, functioning simultaneously as a table, a roof, and a New Year’s tree, makes room for ancient New Year rituals; it gathers people around a table and conveys wishes for the future through words. Rather than marking the end or beginning of a year, it hosts a collective performance that celebrates cyclical time — the continuity in which every ending gives birth to a new beginning.”

“In many cultures, the New Year is celebrated as the reordering of chaos, the renewal of the cosmos, and the restoration of the world to meaningful order. Our table design, inspired by the transition from chaos to cosmos, brings together disorder within a structural system — seeking not to eliminate it, but to make it legible within a framework. Along a grid structure, 106 windows of varying sizes and opening mechanisms come together; food and people gather around a single table.”

Architects Ece Duran and Oğul Öztunç are accompanied by team members Bilge Sayarlıoğlu, Sarp Özgen, Tan Nuhoğlu, and Oğuzhan Tuncay.

December 17, 2024 – January 17, 2025