Savaş Boyraz

Savaş Boyraz’s works have urgency. It is from this urgency that many of his early projects were born. In the wake of political or human crisis, Boyraz would react quickly and assembly his works to channel that urgent energy of the moment. This deep connection with the moment and with the political landscape has become the centre point of his more recent work. Previously, Boyraz was motivated to make works grounded in hard reality, producing documentary-style works. Now, in a move away, that hard reality is the undercurrent in multidimensional works where narratives do not complement but entangle. His inspiration comes now from that unsure space between fiction and reality or ‘surreality’ as Boyraz puts it. After all, most documentaries follow fictional scripts. And so, Boyraz has slowly defined the layers of a dream space, accompanied by a shift in method.

Boyraz now uses, figuratively, a wider lens. His perspective has expanded to unlock layers of architectural, carnal, cultural, emotional, and geographical surfaces as he employs research as opposed to reaction, revealing a decolonial standpoint.

This transition has resulted in a call to new mediums. Boyraz works between photography and film. A project usually starts as a still image project and slowly gains its movement into video. The two become intertwined, often joined by other visual effects, contributing to the complex layering of different narratives. There are however some works which Boyraz feels shun this format and so he lends them three-dimensional space in the form of a ‘wall carpet.’ The work of the human hand weaves a more coherent, stable force into these works, their presence becoming softer and more digestible. Each knot tells its own story. This contrasts to the video and stills of Meanwhile, a film capturing mountains and the people among them during the period of peace talks between the Turkish State and the Kurds. A group of guerrillas, engulfed in a raw silence walk through the scenery in a politically charged and intensely human moment. Boyraz’s work reveals their sadness, their joy, their community, and their loneliness in one. Recent works such as The State we are in / The Crane interlays wallpaper and projection, presenting a striking work about the architecture of violence and how military gentrification is introduced to a region of recent military interventions. Boyraz’s images and stories he hopes can become tools of self-defence; he asks “how can I contribute to the vocabulary of a visual genealogy of cultural self-defence?”

Text by Constance Chester

born in 1980 in Istanbul, Turkey

Education

Since 2021
PhD Candidate at Department of Film and Media at Stockholm University of Arts, SWEDEN

2009-2012
Master of Fine Arts, Konstfack University Collage of Arts Crafts and Design, Stockholm, SWEDEN

2001-2009
Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography, Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, Istanbul, TURKEY

Exhibitions (selection)

2021
Invasive Species, Jan Van Eyck Academy, Maastricht, The Netherlands
Unexpected Storytellers, NGBK, Berlin, Germany
The Immunity, BBK, Munich, Germany
Life, Death, Love and Justice, Tranzit, Bratislava, Slovakia

2020
I relation till, Centrum for Fotografi, Stockholm, Sweden

2019
Somewhere in Between, Borås Konstmuseum, Sweden
the State we are in, Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, Germany (Solo)
In the Blink of a Bird, NGBK, Berlin, Germany
the State we are in, Uqbar, Berlin, Germany (Solo)

2018
Evin's Story, Konstfrämjändet Stockholm, Sweden (Solo)
Mother Tongue, Sveriges Kunstforeningar, Sweden

2017
Mother Tongue, Oslo Museum, Norway

Prizes/Residencies/Scholarships

2020
Jan Van Eyck Academy Residency, Maastricht, The Netherlands
Project Grant for "Invasive Species" Swedish Arts and Grants Committee, Sweden

2019
2 year working grant, Swedish Arts and Grants Committee (IASPIS), Sweden
Residency at Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, funded by IASPIS

2017
VestNorsk Filmsenter project grant for "Birthday Parents", Bergen, Norway

2013
ISCP Artist Residency, New York, USA
Hasselblad Foundation, Victor Fellowship, Gothenburg, Sweden
IASPIS Assistant's Grant (with Hito Steyerl)

2009
HSBC Photography Awards, Best Portfolio, Istanbul, Turkey