Ali Kazma: North
September 10–December 13, 2025
Salah J. Bachir Media Wall
Curator: Gaëlle Morel
In North, Istanbul-based artist Ali Kazma presents a haunting video diptych filmed in Pyramiden, a former Soviet coal mining settlement on Norway’s remote Spitsbergen Island. Once a hub of industrial activity, the site now stands abandoned, with empty barracks, classrooms, and recreation halls slowly overtaken by time. Kazma’s contemplative imagery captures traces of everyday life left behind, set against the stark silence of the Arctic landscape. Rather than focusing on the site's political or historical context, the work reflects on memory, decay, and the endurance of nature through stillness, soft ambient sound, and subdued colour.
Ali Kazma, North, 2017, double-channel video (still). Courtesy of the artist
Bios
Ali Kazma
Ali Kazma (Turkey, b. 1971) is a video artist who documents human activities in labour, industrial production, and social organization. Based in Paris and Istanbul, Kazma holds an MA from The New School in New York City and has exhibited at the Jeu de Paume in Paris (2017), the São Paulo Biennial in Brazil (2012), the Istanbul Biennial (2001, 2007, 2011) in Turkey, the Lyon Biennial in France (2007), and the Havana Biennial in Cuba (2006).
Kazma represented his country in the 55th Venice Biennial in Italy, featuring his video series Resistance (2013). His work is included in the collections of the Centre national des arts plastiques, France; Istanbul Modern, Turkey; Museum Sztuki, Łódź, Poland; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Tate Modern, London, England.
Gaëlle Morel
Gaëlle Morel has been the Exhibitions Curator at The Image Centre since 2010, during which time she has curated dozens of exhibitions and written and edited numerous publications. Her latest projects include Stories from the Picture Press: Black Star Publishing Co. & The Canadian Press; Mary Ellen Mark: Ward 81; and Lee Miller, a Photographer at Work (1932-1945). In 2009, Morel was the guest curator of the photography biennial, Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal. She is currently an instructor in the Film + Photography Preservation and Collections Management graduate program at Toronto Metropolitan University. Morel holds a PhD in the History of Contemporary Photography from Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne.
