Slavs and Tatars: Simurgh Self-Help

This is The Third Line’s third solo exhibition with the artist collective Slavs and Tatar, presenting a new body of work inspired by Marcel Broodthaers’ Musée d’Art Moderne – Département des Aigles (1968-1972) – one of the most influential works of conceptual art of the 20th century. In Simurgh Self-Help, Slavs and Tatars embark on an inventive ‘translation’ of the eagle through the lens of Simurgh, a mythical bird deeply rooted in Turkic and Persianate folklore, Sufi traditions, and the literature of the Caucasus and Central Asia.

Gallery One is dedicated to exploring the mythology of Simurgh, a winged creature often depicted with the body of a peacock and the head of a dog. The exhibition offers a speculative history, presenting an alter-ego for contemporary societies dealing with dilemmas about national identity and nationalism. If the eagle serves as a repository for nationalism and empire, rooted in geopolitical concerns, the Simurgh evokes an empire of senses and a dominion of the otherworldly, bridging the affective and the extractive.

In Gallery Two, the exhibition pivots to explore melons as Central Asian repositories of value, knowledge, and world-building. Writing, central to Slavs and Tatars’ practice, appears in the texture of melon skins and within the pages of books. Here, the melons, depicted as glass lamps or mirrors, tell the story of the region via flora, rather than fauna.

To 4 April.

Above: Slavs and Tatars, This not that (2024)