09/09/2025 - 15/11/2025

unbecomings
09.09.–15.11.2025

Artists: Soufiane Ababri, Berk Akkaya, Hurricane Alexander, Ateş Alpar, Cibelle Cavalli Bastos, Filip Berg, Isaac Chong Wai, Leman Sevda Darıcıoğlu, Pedro Gómez-Egaña, Gašper Kunšič, leo, Sārāh Mārtinus, Jonas Monka, İz Öztat & Ra, Sunny Pfalzer, Spyros Rennt, Denys Shantar, Viron Erol Vert
Curated by: Misal Adnan Yıldız

Opening: Saturday, 06.09.2025, 18:00–20:30
Zilberman |  Berlin Goethestr. 82

6:00 – Blessings
by Istanbul Queer Art Collective

6:15 – Friend to Friend
Jules Van Den Langenberg, Brussels-based curator, shares insights from his conversations with Misal Adnan Yildiz on becoming unbecomings 

6:30 – First Public Listening
Premiere of the music track unbecomings by Cibelle Cavalli Bastos commissioned for the exhibition

Prologue 

Welcome to unbecomings, and nice to meet you. I am unbecomings! You are unbecomings! We are… 

Currently, the Earth is experiencing a period of slightly faster rotation; meaning, days are a bit shorter than 24 hours. This reminds me of the Earth time that passed between the 1990 book Gender Trouble and the 2004 one, Undoing Gender by Judith Butler. Yes, I am still a-sort-of-gender trouble despite all the experiments. Or, I am the problem. The years that passed between these works were spent navigating the complexities of self, much like the Earth experiences, rendering days fractionally shorter.

These are my friends! Hurricane Alexander's gigantic drawings embody the turbulence of our inner worlds, where childlike curiosity clashes with adult anxieties. That’s Hurricane’s portrait shot by Spyros Rennt. His sharp-eyed lens captures the essence of Berlin's queer, trans, and non-binary communities, where diversity converges in a kaleidoscope of experiences. These images, like stepping stones, define a decade of gender revolution, and frame my story. My journey into unbecomings begins with the reclaiming of queer bodies in art history, hidden in painting, and emancipated by the photographic lens. Portraits meet their narratives, and the absence of bodies gives rise to their politics. I first heard unbecoming as a title from a prodigy art student, and much later watched a video on queer failure by Jack Halberstam. Understanding my failings as a catalyst for growth, I invited leo to revisit their 2018 UdK graduation project for this episode, knowing how painful any position with alles auf anfang is. That crown sits on few historical texts related to slavery and emancipation, from Langston Hughes’s The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain (1926) to abolition laws in Brazil and the UK. Add it to your reading list - gegen die AfD. Each room in this exploration is an antidote to real-life experiences – from alienation to isolation, collapse to relapse. Can you discern which one is transformed in which room? The world is in crisis, and we are all continually reconnected and disconnected. I find myself in multiple crises, the world is in crisis, and the climate, nation states, celebrities, institutions, economies, and especially the men in this space, we find refuge from the chaos of the world. 

1 
Have you discovered the city's sacred spots or spent hours waiting in line at clubs, searching for a fleeting high? Hiding in bed? Perhaps it's time to shift your focus, to stretch your mind like Spyros's Beach Stretch or Sunny Platzer's innovative Stretch Sculptures. Sunny's work offers a unique perspective on conviviality and collectivity, weaving together a net of glocal beats. In the dimly lit recesses of a year's end, a performance unfolded, its significance dwarfed by the shadows. Were these rooms present then, or did they emerge later, like whispers in the wind? What was forgotten in the recent renovation, left to gather dust in the recesses of memory? unbecomings prioritizes the safety of birds, ensuring they don't collide with glass windows. Bird stickers, like gentle guardians, protect both the birds and us, as a testament to our shared vulnerability. Birds are such protagonists that inspire humanity for diversity, mobility and free will. Consider Pedro Gómez-Egaña's Vaucanson's Duck, a poignant symbol of disconnection and longing, where two entities fly in different directions, forever missing each other in transit. Soufiane Ababri's heartfelt drawings give rise to an anthology, a testament to the power of art to shape our understanding of the queer heritage. Do you wanna draw yours? This city offers so many dark experiences. Like a family tree, the stars above connect us to our ancestors, our darlings, and our dark-links. In this city, where paths loop and intersect, we find ourselves navigating looping regressions, grey zones and roads to escape. Yet, it's here that unbecomings defines our queer time, opening spaces for reflection and introspection. Connecting with our bodies means reconnecting with our souls. Healing is a non-linear journey, marked by setbacks and breakthroughs. We're reminded of the elemental forces that shape our world: wind, water, soil, and fire – a unity of power that predates human existence, yet remains poorly understood. Jonas Monka's tiny objects, hidden within the room's most characteristic architectural structure, evoke the voice of activist Lou Sullivan, a testament to the impact of subtle yet profound gestures.

2 
As I gaze upon Viron Erol Vert's Pearl Passage, I'm struck by the juxtaposition of the migrant and the fetish. Leo Bersani's seminal work, Is the Rectum a Grave? (1987), resonates deeply as a poignant reminder of the AIDS epidemic's dark legacy. The capitalist machine continued to churn, indifferent to the COVID with less human suffering. The question lingers: Why aren't we still equally human? Filip Berg's installation brings the body issue to the forefront, a cynical commentary on desire and politics. Our bodies are our sole refuge, our ultimate sanctuary. I'm learning to resist the insidious grip of yoga-fascist capitalism through self-care. If relapse is a form of unlearning, when does relearning begin? Remembering is an integral part of withdrawal, healing, and reconnaissance – a paradoxical experience that's both monstrous and benevolent. Your body is everything and more. Euphrates' flame Ateş Alpar's visualizer, created for the late Arkadaş Z. Özger, speaks to the queer spirits’ quest for freedom within systems of oppression. Their eyes seek to understand failure's logic, while their ears listen to the spaces marked by damage. Queer resonance is the ultimate form of escape, a disruption of heteronormativity, normalization, and cisnormativity. More Spyros.

3
What if Andersen’s  little match girl survives, becoming a community carer? Leman Sevda Darıcıoğlu's puzzle, composed of latex, soil, and other materials, invites us to consider the body as a measure. The artwork is a living document, a testament to a life spent in art spaces, residencies, and institutions. Hurricane’s wild tone with a call for mental peace… Isaac Chong Wai's understanding of tension is unparalleled. Can we truly handle a handle for two with digital loneliness? Denys Shantar's portrayal of Saint Stephen, who is accused of blasphemy and stoned to death, cries I built a home with the stones you threw at me – a powerful statement of resilience and defiance. Alas. We also built, and will build more homes with the stones you threw at us. Peace begins with shedding the toxic elements that poison, destroy, and kill us. We're not merely upcycling; we're resisting the vampire economy that feeds on our vitality. Our bodies, homes, lands, and planets are akin to gardens – we reap what we sow. Cibelle Cavalli Bastos's cosmology is a testament to the power of creativity and remembrance, from sound to image-making, or materiality to digitality. Their composition comes with an AI-generated voice, and all the instruments are samples from their own, transcending the physical realm, echoing long after the physical body of this exhibit is gone. If these drawings don't embody unbecoming, what does? Wake up, dear unbecomings – we inhabit Rosa Luxemburg's armed peace, Armed Peace02, a state of perpetual war, imperialism, militarist gentrification, genocide and settler colonialism. The violence, injustice, and inequality that plague places like Gaza, Congo, Ukraine, Sudan, Syria, Burkina Faso, Mali, Somalia, Nigeria, Myanmar, Yemen, Haiti, and West Papua serve as a stark reminder that conflicts in one location have far-reaching consequences. Fuck the machine! Men historically comprise the majority of combatants, military leaders, dictators etc. Berk Akkaya's finest Fuck Machine, embodies the raw sentiment of politics of desire, human nature, and resistance against the machine. We're suspended in a liminal space, caught between the familiar and the unknown. As we navigate the complexities of regressions, resolutions, and intimacies, we emerge transformed, our experiences imbued with a newfound power. Why do I recall Edward Said's image, captured by Agence France-Presse on July 3, 2000?

4 

Mother, am I still your child, despite my queer failings? My presence here is not a result of personal achievement, but rather the support of friends who have become my chosen family. This is my home, my hometown, and my homework… life's work – exploring the depths of unbecoming. Shadow work, or back to shame and guilt? I found an answer. In Ocean Vuong’s poetry: "Time is a mother." Our bodies, like gardens, require tender care and nurturing. We're living in a narrow age, where unbecomings invites us to breathe amidst the chaos. In a world where life's pace, our bodies, and transitions are constantly shifting, unbecomings offers a temporary shelter for unraveling. Like a curiosity cabinet or Pandora's box, unbecomings invites you to pause and breathe. Overthinking is overrated, think non-binary! Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick really believed non-binary thinking could free us from oversimplified and hurtful politics by embracing complexity and nuance. She would love this duo! The conversations between Iz Öztat and Ra unfold like an imaginary time spent between Zişan and Vita Sackville-West – a delicate dance of proximity and distance, where touch is mediated through objects and words. Their sculpture Aid, moves around the promenade through the audience circulation from one event to another. Have I spoken too-too-much- much? You get an open end, rather than a grade finale. The hearts crafted by Gašper Kunšič embody love, born from formalist patterns, formworks, and matrices that repeat in different colors, in varying shades of darkness. Consents are doors to consciousness, and windows for care, all are carried, and is carrying. With İz & Ra’s consent and request, earlier work ribbons, singular/plural forms of hearts deliver you the message: -to be continued! 

Epilogue 

Like Magnus Hirschfeld, Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, Zeliş Deniz, Boysan Yakar, or Muhsin Hendricks, we are all part of a larger narrative of reconstruction of hope, resistance and resilience. 

I shall let these images, forms and narratives speak to you? Don't they generously reveal how bodies, their absences, sculptures, and narratives unfold in diverse ways? They illustrate our connection to communities, which we shape from within over time with patience. These mostly soft sculptures - if not soft heartened- can represent community carers with gentle souls who dedicate themselves to the greater good, fostering collective consciousness and a shared, fluid life. 

If alles ist material, then let us leave you with a question from another unbecoming, Paul B. Preciado: Can the monster speak? 

And so, we wait for the next episode, 10th of October, when Sārāh Mārtinus will read us a poem, written from a perspective winding through The Dreaming, where past, present, and future are all now. We are all included as semi-divine serpent-beings; Nāgā, who birthed 'the world' into being.

There is no accident, coincidence, error, or mistake for unbecomings. We are not only the architects, but also the poets of our unbecomings asking: When the dust settles, what will remain?

Text by: Misal Adnan Yıldız