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Image \u00a9 Hikmet Guler<\/p>\n Image \u00a9 Hikmet Guler<\/p>\n
We paid a visit to the studio of young multi-disciplinary artist Zeynep Birced, located in Galatasaray. Her modest atelier mirrors her effortless eclectic taste, and her similarly varied work. Birced confessed she works best in there when she invites other artists to work in the studio, in order to create a collective atmosphere of concentrated work. Birced knew she would go to art school already early on, and more specifically, she knew she\u2019d go to Central Saint Martins, where she received her graduate degree. Learning how to visualise things, she says, was one of the most important things she acquired there. After four years in London, Birced returned to Istanbul, and there are many positive sides to being here, she says.\u201cI\u2019m not complaining about Istanbul like a lot of people do, I think I\u2019m quite satisfied here\u201d. Of course one of the most important sides of being in Istanbul is the fact that anything, any material she might need, is available \u2013 and at a very reasonable price, too. But though she says she is quite content here for now, she sees herself as a nomad, with a passion for exploring new places that would feed her creativity.<\/p>\n
Birced works with various materials \u2013 too many to mention \u2013 which change according to whatever she\u2019s producing. Never limiting herself to one discipline, her work spans paintings and collages to massive brass tree installations.\u00a0Birced\u2019s initial focus is on the meaning of every unit when taken apart from the whole discourse. The work she exhibited in the Contemporary Istanbul art fair consisted of pages of a single book, an interactive piece where the visitors could choose any page and take it with them.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She occasionally turns to collage, regarding it as a \u201crelaxing space\u201d. She doesn\u2019t get inspired by things or places but rather by the things she reads or the music she listens to. \u201cI try to exclude aesthetics from my works but it seemed futile after a while, as even when you look at a Maslow triangle you realise there\u2019s aesthetics in everything.\u201d Another point of interest in her work is the conflict between the Id and the Super Ego. \u201cIt\u2019s interesting how humans fell trees, produce paper out of them and write \u2018save the trees\u2019 on it. Its almost an oxymoron.\u201d She tends to play with these situations as moments of comic relief, also using the titles as important elements of her works: \u201cThe fact that everything exists alongside its opposite, that\u2019s what triggers me.\u201d<\/p>\n