Leaking time

2021 Video
Close vertical video still of a white-painted forearm and hand against a pale background. The arm enters diagonally from the upper left and bends downward at the wrist, with the fingers hanging loosely. A narrow red line of blood runs along the length of the forearm, follows the inner contour of the wrist and continues toward the hand. The white-painted skin becomes difficult to distinguish from the similarly pale background in places.
Close horizontal video still of a white-painted hand hanging against a pale background. The wrist enters from the upper left and the fingers curve downward. A dark red trace of blood follows the edge of the thumb, and a thick drop hangs from the tip of the thumb. The white-painted hand partially blends into the pale background.
Video: Elif Çak, Yelta Köm

“Time has been scaled according to human reproductivity. Even today, when sexual activity is no longer understood solely in terms of reproduction and desire is embraced—though still predominantly within heterosexual frameworks—a human being is perceived as an adult upon reaching reproductive capacity. There is no space for queerness within this timescale.” Leman Sevda Darıcıoğlu

In Leaking time, Leman Sevda Darıcıoğlu approaches the effects of hegemonic notions of time on the queer body. Beginning with the question of whether queer time can exist within the temporality we currently inhabit, Darıcıoğlu arrives at the impossibility of thinking queerness within dominant perceptions of time, in which life is measured according to reproductivity and queer life is structurally excluded from this scale.

In the Leaking time videos, Darıcıoğlu cuts themself before filming begins but does not show the moment of cutting to the audience, deliberately avoiding an image that could be perceived as self-harm. Leaking time I begins with a vertical image of a white-painted arm against a white wall. At points, the arm almost blends into the background. A line of blood runs down the arm, tracing its contour before forming and releasing several drops. Leaking time II begins with a horizontal image of a white-painted hand against a white wall, with a tiny cut beside the thumb. Blood flows from the cut, slowly fills the gap between the fingers, runs downward, and gradually congeals at the fingertip. Drops of coagulated blood fall several times at intervals.

While Leaking time I produces a visually beautiful, almost sculptural image through the white-painted arm and the line of blood, in Leaking time II the coagulating blood produces a sense of disgust. Through these two contrasting images—one beautiful and the other disgusting—and through the white-painted body parts that almost merge with the white wall, Leaking time addresses queer visibility and invisibility, disgust directed towards queerness, and the conditions of aestheticized recognition.

Installation view through a doorway into a white-walled gallery. A single vertically oriented monitor is mounted on the far wall, showing the white-painted forearm and hand with a thin red line of blood running down the arm. The monitor appears small within the surrounding white wall, while the doorway and adjacent walls frame the view.
Installation view of two wall-mounted monitors on a white gallery wall. The monitor at left is vertical and shows a white-painted forearm and hand; the monitor at right is horizontal and shows a close view of a white-painted hand. Red traces of blood remain visible against the otherwise pale images. The two screens are separated by a broad expanse of blank wall above a dark wooden floor.
Wide installation view of a white-walled gallery with a dark wooden floor and a square structural column near the center. On the wall beyond the column, two monitors are mounted at different heights and orientations: a vertical screen showing a white-painted forearm and hand, and a horizontal screen showing a white-painted hand. A small framed work hangs alone on the adjoining wall at left. The pale video images sit within the open, brightly lit gallery space.
Photography: Yelta Köm
Presentations
Tempo Incognito: On Flows, Rhythm, and Movement, curated by Rana Öztürk, Depo, Istanbul, TR, 2021
Credits
Leaking time, by Leman Sevda Darıcıoğlu, video, 2021
Video by Elif Çak, Yelta Köm
Production assistant: Irem Avcı
Acknowledgements: Elif Çiğdem Artan, Performistanbul, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U)
Video Chronopolitics Grief Body Intervention
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