The exhibition organised in collaboration with the Istanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture Agency within the scope of "Istanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture" programme that took place in Istanbul Art Port last year is going to be opened on the 3rd of March, Thursday at 19:00 at EMAA Art Capital Centre.

The exhibition that emerged from a collaboration of the European-Mediterranean Arts Association (EMAA) and the Cyprus Chamber of Fine Arts (EKATE) presented artists and their artwork from both communities in Istanbul. The exhibition mainly aimed to provide the artists living in Cyprus with a platform for discussing, interpreting and artistically expressing the dialogue and tension between the island and the continent through means of art, thereby enabling them to express research on theories and methods, critical and analytical views from their own personal perspective by introducing their artwork to the audience in the Istanbul exhibition.

The ENGAGE is implemented by The Management Centre and the NGO Support Centre, funded by the UNDP-ACT Programme and supported by the Small Grant Programme as well as Ramadan Cemil Enterprise. "The Little Land Fish" exhibition curators Antonis Danos and Zeynep Yasa Yaman, and artists Klitsa Antoniou, Adi Atassi, Katerina Attalidou, Melita Couta, Yiannos Economou, Mustafa Erkan, Özgül Ezgin, Tatiana Ferahian, Grup 102 (Özge Ertanın, Oya Silbery Evren Erkut), Yioula Hatzigeorgiou, Lia Lapithi, Vicky Pericleous, Andreas Savva, Serhat Selışık –Doğuş Bozkurt and Zehra Şonya will discuss the situation in Cyprus by using a little fish’s adventure to reach greater seas from an alternative point of view. The exhibition assistants are Dilek Şener and Argyro Toumazou.

The exhibition is inspired by Samed Behrengi’s children’s book "Little Black Fish" which is themed around justice, equality, questioning dogma and swimming against the tide. The protagonist of the tale is a little fish that lives in a riverbank, and the story is centred around his troublesome voyage to the sea and eventual freedom that is achieved by swimming against the tide and overcoming extreme fear of death. The artists presenting their artwork in this exhibition are immensely inspired by the major themes of the book, such as swimming against the tide, breaching the oppressive barriers, standing up for rights, leading the society to break off the chains that bind them to the cramped environment created within the society, and shedding light on how to expand its horizons.