SALON ISTANBUL

ÖZLEM SULAK

12 Eylül (September 12) | TR 2009 | 45'

In this meditative and monumental examination of the legacy of Turkey’s 1980 military coup, individual narrations of the tumultuous event are juxtaposed with quotidian routines, thirty years on.

Granny | TR 2005 | 9’20’’

In the video Granny she conducts an interview with her grandmother and great-aunt about their history of immigration from Yugoslavia to Turkey. Together with the video Cousin (2005), where Sulak documents her trip from Hildesheim to Hannover and the first encounter with her relatives living there, the film convey a very inconsistent image of Sulak's family: the two elderly, remorseful ladies pull Turkey to pieces and seem to have felt uncomfortable there all their life; the family of the aunt and cousin, on the other hand, leads a very traditional Turkish life in Germany. Where can Sulak herself be positioned? She only allows for a very indirect answer to this question.

Özlem Sulak was born 1979 in Kayseri, TR, lives in Istanbul. She uses the media of video and photography to deal with her own past, with the history of her family and the different ways her family comes to terms with migration. Sulak's experiences in Western countries such as Great Britain and Germany and her examination of the stereotypes with which she was confronted, led to a group of works that analyse individual identities and show their instability and ambiguity. She is always concerned with personal freedom and the investigation of different societies and their images.

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