I can hardly imagine places as unpleasant as the toilet on a train. You don't need to have claustrophobia or germophobia to feel claustrophobic there. It's a place I prefer to avoid. When the need is urgent and I step into the tiny cubicle, whose walls are covered in tags and stickers, while I fly at a speed of 200 kilometers per hour over the Belgian railways, I want to get out of there as quickly as possible. That probably applies to you as well. But not for the artist Okan Mentes. This nineteen-year-old from Brussels knows how to find beauty even in the ugliest places. In this exhibition, there is a photo he took of the water that was cyclone-like sucked into the depths through the stainless steel bottom of the train toilet bowl. This may sound like a joke – a kind of Duchamp-like stunt – but it is not. Okan did not take the photo with the intention of making a conceptual artwork. He took the photo solely because he saw something aesthetic. And the fact that this aesthetic lay in the bottom of a toilet bowl is actually irrelevant.
Artists are not known for being modest. I can assure you that Okan is an exception to this. When I first met him a few weeks ago, I was surprised by his infectious enthusiasm and eager-to-learn attitude. He seemed to be well aware that as a young artist, he still had much to learn. I see that modesty reflected in his artworks as well. This exhibition is certainly not a loud declaration of a coherent philosophy. It is rather an uncertain search for fragmented beauties.
