Page - 95 - in Mobile Culture Studies - The Journal, Volume 4/2018

Mobile Culture Studies. The Journal 4 2o18 Lora Sariaslan | The Art of Migration 95 would better reflect the stereotype of the Turk in Germany. This alteration on my face had a great impact on my daily life. People’s reaction to my appearance changed completely. In the circles where I usually hang out, I suddenly became unpopular, I was negatively judged and considered not sexy by women while, by contrast, I was greeted with a friendly ‘Selaam aley- kum’ when I passed by Turkish and Arab cafes and gained enthusiastic compliments from my uncles and aunties. I had my photograph taken with this Turkish moustache and I passed it onto the authorities for the issuing of the passport. Now I am the owner of a German passport with a photo that conforms to the cliché of the typical Turk, but in reality, has nothing to do with me.”12 In his Self-Portrait (2000) (Fig. 1), Nasan Tur embodies the reinforced national stereotype of a dark-skinned Turk with a moustache on a German identity card, a ‘place’ where ev- erything is in German, and where the Turk is absent. The moustache, as the cultural Turk- ish ‘suffix,’ is not translated into German. The work is not a representation of Tur, but a parodic mime of stereotypes of ‘authentic’ Turkishness that reflect only our projections of identity; and indeed, it undermines any claims to fixed or authentic identity. Al- though enjoying growing the exaggerated ‘Turkish moustache,’ Tur was also aware of a clear change and increasing process of ex- clusion from his own circles. In addition, the fun was not extended to the border controls where he was not only seen as foreign but also threatening and therefore inspected. A passport or an identity card lies on the border of private and public, individual and ordi- nary. It is a tool of altered heterogenic significance when abroad, and simultaneously a definer of identity through national affiliation. In a humorous way, Tur demonstrates that identity depends mostly on diverse forms, namely contact with others and their reading or reception of the signs. Comparing ‘presumed’ or ‘pre-conceived’ Turkish and German stereotypes, he examines the subject of identity and its social implications. The work is humorous and ironic, yet, investigative and critical at the same time. Achille Bonito Oliva, the artistic director of the 1993 Venice Biennial and one of the earli- est art critics and curators in Europe to discuss the effect of globalization on art writes: “A work of art comes to function much like a mixer, blending together diverse languages while causing traditional aesthetic categories to dematerialize. It acts on the viewing public with the alienating force of reality in motion, by the ability to affirm its own lack of consensus. Its consistent nature of diaspora springs from a tradition going from the historical avant-garde to trans-avant-garde, and it witnesses that art is autonomous and that it cannot operate accord- ing to the principles of identification. Contemporary art successfully exploits the overcoming of traditional barriers, to gain access to the rapidity of itineraries that play on the principle of 12 Karin Pernegger, ‘Nasan Tur’, Failed 2014, 46. Fig. 1: Nasan Tur, Self-portrait, 2000. Origi- nal German passport, 7x10 cm. Courtesy of the artist.