ACME, 1994
I would not call this a conspiracy. It is much more like a dream coming true. To chase the Muslims out of Europe is the European dream. To cleanse Europe of the “the Turks” was the dying thought of the greatest figure of the Enlightenment: ‘It is not enough to humiliate them; they should be destroyed,’ urged Voltaire. Beat the Turks, and I will die content,’ he confided to the Russian Empress. The dream is still very much alive, living as dreams live.
Tomaz Mastnak “A Journal on the Plague Years: Notes on European Anti-nationalism,” Lusitania, No. 5, Fall 1993
In February 1993, during the opening of an exhibition of Dutch and Turkish artists, which I had co-curated, I was approached by a project manager of the Netherlands Office for Fine Arts. She requested a vitae and told me that her institution was considering me as one of the possible curators for a major exhibition of European Art to take place in Rotterdam. I sent her the materials she requested and, in turn, received general information about the exhibition. I wrote three times in the next six months to learn about the progress of the project. There was no reply.
I later learned that Turkey would not be in the European Art exhibition because a high-ranking employee of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs had reasoned that it was an Islamic country! That was why they didn’t even bother to send me a refusal note. I faxed the Netherlands Office for Fine Arts for the fourth time to ask about the exclusion of Bosnia and Turkey. The following is the answer I got:
“… the participation of European “border” countries in the EAM has been point of discussions we had with several institutions from which the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs was the most imported (sic!) one. Acting up to their definition we had to conclude that Turkey should not be considered as part of Europe and therefore should not be invited to participate in the European Art Manifestation…”
Project Manager, European Art Manifestation March 21, 1994
In principle all European Countries: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bellarussia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finnland (sic), France, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Latvia, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Rumenia (sic), Spain, Slowakia (sic), Sweden, Switserland (sic), The Netherlands, Ukraine.
European Art Manifestation Project Sheet March 11, 1994
A few months later, the Netherlands Office for Fine Arts sent me an invitation to write an “essay” of 250 words about Europe to be considered as one of the curators. I had to do that so as to be legitimately excluded.
vasıf kortun 