Hungarian-born American conceptual artist Agnes Denes based in New York hopes to enlighten Istanbulities with her site-specific installation "Living Pyramid" in Sabancı University Sakıp Sabancı Museum (SSM).

As a pioneer of the ecofeminist art school, Denes strived to portray humankind's relationship with nature as a metaphor for existence in the world. Along with "Living Pyramid," Denes' "Manifesto," written in 1969, will also be displayed in SSM's garden.

Denes' artistic practice is unique in her relation to aesthetic and socio-political ideas. In addition to inspiring and encouraging action through her art, she seeks to call for "attention to societal concerns" and involve people from all walks of life through her art practice that is sensitive, uncompromising in its artistic intent, and manages to be both kind and powerful. The sensitivity of the world to fundamental problems such as environmental pollution and climate change can be seen in all of Denes' works and actions. For this reason, the artist has spent most of the last 40 years presenting her ecological and philosophical ideas to communities in every geography.

"Living Pyramid" was first built in 2015 at Socrates Sculpture Park in New York and then at Nordstadtpark in Kassel in 2017 as part of Documenta 14. It can be interpreted as a sculpture with a natural life cycle. Consisting of wooden stepped terraces filled with 4 tons of soil, the pyramid stretches 9 meters (30 feet) into the sky. The terraces of the pyramid include 2,000 plants and flowers consisting of 600 different species that were specifically selected by the artist regarding the urban flora of Istanbul. During the placement of the plants, the amount of sun that they receive and shade were also calculated.

While on display, the pyramid will evolve, plants will sprout and bloom, and some will eventually complete their life cycle.

Museum director Nazan Ölçer said: "This year's focus of the contemporary art exhibitions, which started with the Contemporary Meeting in 2007 at SSM and took place every two years, is Agnes Denes, one of the leading names in ecological art. COVID-19, which has been affecting the whole world for the last two years, has multiplied our environmental concerns and has encouraged us to contemplate our relationship with the earth deeply."

"Denes has participated in hundreds of exhibitions in museums and galleries around the world since the early 1960s. In addition to her large-scale environmental projects, Denes' drawings, paintings and three-dimensional works are in the collections of many major institutions around the world. We are quite excited that 'Living Pyramid' will be her first work to be exhibited in Türkiye. Our 'Living Pyramid,' whose planting process was completed thanks to the volunteers, will grow and change shape as thousands of seeds turn into grass and flowers," Ölçer added.

Denes continually expands ideas, forms and processes with an inexhaustible curiosity and brings environmental issues to the surface with her farseeing vision of the future of humanity. The vision she unveils boldly evaluates reality; yet at the same time, she continues to look to the future with hope.

"In line with the artist's desire, her 'Manifesto' placed on marble, specially produced for this exhibition, will now take its place in our collection as a permanent part of the garden. It is another source of pride for us that the person who accepted and read the artist's 'Manifesto' is the precious writer Buket Uzuner, who has also brought ecological concerns to the agenda for many years. This way, Denes' 'Living Pyramid' will have achieved its true purpose, supported by educational programs that promote environmental awareness, conservation, sustainability and environmental awareness," Ölçer also said.

Thanking Sabancı Holding and Çimsa for their valuable support throughout the project, Ölçer said: "After the exhibition, Sakıp Sabancı Museum will continue to invite the audience to embrace the plants of Denes within the framework of her nature-sensitive approach. This monument will continue to "live" on small pieces owned by the people."

Denes, who aims to reveal the organic development of nature while interacting with the pyramid, one of the most iconic forms of human civilization, said: "Pyramids are based on mathematics and they somehow reach a point of perfection. At the same time, they embody all the flaws that they represent and visualize." She has been using the pyramid form as a metaphor in different mediums such as drawing and sculpture for nearly half a century and also questions the social hierarchies in our intellectual understanding through this form.

"Understanding the finitude of human existence and still striving to create beauty and provocative reasoning, finding new concepts, recognizing new patterns, desiring to know the importance or insignificance of existence, seeing reality and still being able to dream, persisting in the eternal search," Denes' "Manifesto" claims.

The "Living Pyramid" can be visited at SSM until Jan. 29, 2023.