Kutlug Ataman
Encyclopedia
Kutluğ Ataman is a filmmaker and contemporary artist. He lives in Istanbul.
His films have been described as combining documentary-style filmmaking with the intimacy of the home-movie genre.
Ataman’s second feature Lola+Bilidikid (1998) was selected to open the Panorama section of the 49th International Berlin Film Festival. This fast moving story is set in Berlin, with main characters from the city’s Turkish community. Ataman’s film is strong mixture of humour and violence, tackling a society’s racial and sexual identity prejudices head on. As well as its successful commercial release in Germany, Turkey, the US and in other territories, the film was a major hit at festivals. It won awards in Turin, Oslo, and Istanbul and was given the Best Film prize at New York’s The New Festival, and the Jury Special Prize at the Berlin Festival.
His third feature 2 Girls (2005) is an adaptation of Perihan Mağden’s novel İki Genç Kızın Romanı with screenplay and direction by Ataman. The two teenage girl protagonists, with their contrasting characteristics and social backgrounds, form close bonds, with strong sexual undertones. Istanbul is again the backdrop for the film – a more stark, contemporary urban landscape than in Serpent’s Tale. Ataman directs a well- paced and entertaining look at the fragility of the relationship of the teenagers, and of their dreams and hopes. The film was a commercial and critical success and confirmed Ataman’s position in the top rank of the leading Turkish filmmakers. He was awarded Best Director and Best Film prizes for 2 Girls at both the Ankara and Antalya Film Festivals, and Best Film at the Asian Film Festival in India.
His more recent film, Journey to the Moon (2009), was shown in the Official Selection at the 2009 International Istanbul Film Festival. It forms part of the Mesopotamian Dramaturgies series of visual works, first exhibited in Linz, Austria in early 2009. The film is set in a remote village in Erzincan province, Eastern Turkey. The quest of four villagers to travel to the moon is documented with the use of found black-and-white photos and the aid of a local narrator. A wide range of established Turkish intellectuals offer their views of the events that took place in 1957. The resulting film curiously becomes an in-depth study of contemporary Turkish culture, rather than an historical documentary. The film was selected to the "Perspectives" Section at the 31st Moscow International Film Festival, 19–28 June 2009. It was screened at the BFI 53rd London Film Festival in October 2009.
Kutluğ Ataman was Chair of the Jury at the Istanbul International Film Festival in April 2009.
diva
Semiha Berksoy
. Ataman was then invited to participate in the 48th Venice Biennale where he presented Women Who Wear Wigs which features four women - a revolutionary whose face remained obscured, well-known journalist
and breast cancer
survivor Nevval Sevindi, an anonymous devout Muslim
student, and an activist and transsexual prostitute. At the prestigious Documenta
11 exhibition in Kassel, Germany Ataman presented The 4 Seasons of Veronica Read a work that was also included in Days Like These, the Tate Triennial Exhibition of Contemporary British Art 2003 at the Tate Britain. He was shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 2004 where he showed Twelve. In the same year he won the prestigious Carnegie Prize for his work Küba, a 40-channel installation filmed in a poor enclave by that name in Istanbul, in 2005.
Other notable solo exhibitions include Mesopotamian Dramaturgies at the Lentos Künstmuseum in Austria; fff at Thomas Dane Gallery, London; Paradise and Küba at the Vancouver Art Gallery; Paradise at the Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, California; De-Regulation With the Work of Kutluğ Ataman at MuHKA in Belgium; Küba at the Sorting Office in London as part of Artangel
commissions; the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney and Long Streams at the Serpentine Gallery in London. His most recent solo exhibition, a mid-career retrospective was The Enemy Inside Me at Istanbul Modern (Nov 2010 - March 2011). Group exhibitions include the Moscow Biennial; Without Boundary, Seventeen Ways of Looking, MOMA New York; Documentary Fictions, Caixa Forum, Barcelona; Testimonies: between Fiction and Reality, National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece and Manifesta 2, Luxembourg.
His works are in major international collections, including MoMA New York, the Tate, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, Istanbul Modern, Istanbul, the Dimitris Daskalopoulos Collection, Athens and the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh.
12 April - 11 September 2011, "Küba", The Luminous Interval D. Daskalopoulus Collection, Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, Spain www.guggenheim-bilbao.es
8 April - 5 June 2011, "Twelve", Tactics of Invisibility, ARTER, Istanbul, Turkey www.arter.org.tr
10 November 2010 - 6 March 2011, The Enemy Inside Me, Istanbul Modern, Turkey
30 May - 12 September 2010, "Mesopotamian Dramaturgies", MAXXI, National Museum of 21st Century Arts, Rome, Italy
13 April - 2 May 2010, "fff", Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK
10 October 2009 - 10 January 2010, Women Who Wear Wigs, Little Theatre of Gestures, Malmö Konsthall, Sweden
1 September 2009 - 31 January 2010, "Küba" and "Paradise", Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Germany
Life and career
Kutluğ Ataman received his school education in Istanbul before doing his university studies in the US. His interest in film started an early age, and led him to do film studies at UCLA where he graduated with an MFA in 1988. He established himself as a film-maker with Serpent’s Tale (Karanlık Sular) (1994), and has gone on to make two further features: Lola+Bilidikid (1998) and 2 Girls (2005). His most recent film is Journey to the Moon" (2009). In 1997 he was invited to take part in the Istanbul Biennial with the long, documentary-style work kutluğ ataman's semiha b. unplugged". This was the start of an art career which has run in parallel with his career as a film-maker. He has won many awards for his films, was nominated for the 2004 Turner Prize, won the Carnegie Prize in the same year and the Capital Abraaj Prize in 2009. He is currently the 2011 Laureate of the European Cultural Fund 'Routes' Princess Margriet Award for cultural diversity. His works are in collections such as MoMA New York and the Tate, and have also been shown in the major Biennials, including Venice and São Paulo, and at Documenta.Working practice
Kutluğ Ataman's works primarily document the lives of marginalized individuals, examining the ways in which people create and rewrite their identities through self-expression, blurring the line between reality and fiction.His films have been described as combining documentary-style filmmaking with the intimacy of the home-movie genre.
Films
Kutluğ Ataman's first feature, Serpent’s Tale (Karanlık Sular) (1994) is a drama set against the beauty of a decaying Istanbul. Scripted and directed by Ataman, this dark murder story grips its audience, taking us into a world where old and new confront. Critics praised the way in which Ataman successfully encapsulates the crisis of contemporary Turkish culture through this skilfully crafted and visually rich film. Serpent’s Tale brought Ataman rapid acclaim and was invited to numerous festivals, from Montreal to Shanghai. Its many awards include Best Film, Director and Screenplay from the Turkish Film Critics Association at the Istanbul International Film Festival, plus the Jury Prize at the Ankara International Festival.Ataman’s second feature Lola+Bilidikid (1998) was selected to open the Panorama section of the 49th International Berlin Film Festival. This fast moving story is set in Berlin, with main characters from the city’s Turkish community. Ataman’s film is strong mixture of humour and violence, tackling a society’s racial and sexual identity prejudices head on. As well as its successful commercial release in Germany, Turkey, the US and in other territories, the film was a major hit at festivals. It won awards in Turin, Oslo, and Istanbul and was given the Best Film prize at New York’s The New Festival, and the Jury Special Prize at the Berlin Festival.
His third feature 2 Girls (2005) is an adaptation of Perihan Mağden’s novel İki Genç Kızın Romanı with screenplay and direction by Ataman. The two teenage girl protagonists, with their contrasting characteristics and social backgrounds, form close bonds, with strong sexual undertones. Istanbul is again the backdrop for the film – a more stark, contemporary urban landscape than in Serpent’s Tale. Ataman directs a well- paced and entertaining look at the fragility of the relationship of the teenagers, and of their dreams and hopes. The film was a commercial and critical success and confirmed Ataman’s position in the top rank of the leading Turkish filmmakers. He was awarded Best Director and Best Film prizes for 2 Girls at both the Ankara and Antalya Film Festivals, and Best Film at the Asian Film Festival in India.
His more recent film, Journey to the Moon (2009), was shown in the Official Selection at the 2009 International Istanbul Film Festival. It forms part of the Mesopotamian Dramaturgies series of visual works, first exhibited in Linz, Austria in early 2009. The film is set in a remote village in Erzincan province, Eastern Turkey. The quest of four villagers to travel to the moon is documented with the use of found black-and-white photos and the aid of a local narrator. A wide range of established Turkish intellectuals offer their views of the events that took place in 1957. The resulting film curiously becomes an in-depth study of contemporary Turkish culture, rather than an historical documentary. The film was selected to the "Perspectives" Section at the 31st Moscow International Film Festival, 19–28 June 2009. It was screened at the BFI 53rd London Film Festival in October 2009.
Kutluğ Ataman was Chair of the Jury at the Istanbul International Film Festival in April 2009.
Artworks
Ataman entered the art world first in 1997 when he took part in the 5th International Istanbul Biennial where he presented kutluğ ataman's semiha b. unplugged" a long-form documentary of the operaOpera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
diva
Diva
A diva is a celebrated female singer. The term is used to describe a woman of outstanding talent in the world of opera, and, by extension, in theatre, cinema and popular music. The meaning of diva is closely related to that of "prima donna"....
Semiha Berksoy
Semiha Berksoy
Semiha Berksoy was one of the first Turkish opera singers, the prima donna of the Turkish opera, a painter, and an internationally acclaimed artist....
. Ataman was then invited to participate in the 48th Venice Biennale where he presented Women Who Wear Wigs which features four women - a revolutionary whose face remained obscured, well-known journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
and breast cancer
Breast cancer
Breast cancer is cancer originating from breast tissue, most commonly from the inner lining of milk ducts or the lobules that supply the ducts with milk. Cancers originating from ducts are known as ductal carcinomas; those originating from lobules are known as lobular carcinomas...
survivor Nevval Sevindi, an anonymous devout Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
student, and an activist and transsexual prostitute. At the prestigious Documenta
Documenta
documenta is an exhibition of modern and contemporary art which takes place every five years in Kassel, Germany. It was founded by artist, teacher and curator Arnold Bode in 1955 as part of the Bundesgartenschau which took place in Kassel at that time...
11 exhibition in Kassel, Germany Ataman presented The 4 Seasons of Veronica Read a work that was also included in Days Like These, the Tate Triennial Exhibition of Contemporary British Art 2003 at the Tate Britain. He was shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 2004 where he showed Twelve. In the same year he won the prestigious Carnegie Prize for his work Küba, a 40-channel installation filmed in a poor enclave by that name in Istanbul, in 2005.
Other notable solo exhibitions include Mesopotamian Dramaturgies at the Lentos Künstmuseum in Austria; fff at Thomas Dane Gallery, London; Paradise and Küba at the Vancouver Art Gallery; Paradise at the Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, California; De-Regulation With the Work of Kutluğ Ataman at MuHKA in Belgium; Küba at the Sorting Office in London as part of Artangel
Artangel
Artangel is a London-based arts organisation founded in 1985 by Roger Took. Directed since 1991 by James Lingwood and Michael Morris, it has commissioned and produced a string of notable site-specific works, plus several projects for TV, film, radio and the web...
commissions; the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney and Long Streams at the Serpentine Gallery in London. His most recent solo exhibition, a mid-career retrospective was The Enemy Inside Me at Istanbul Modern (Nov 2010 - March 2011). Group exhibitions include the Moscow Biennial; Without Boundary, Seventeen Ways of Looking, MOMA New York; Documentary Fictions, Caixa Forum, Barcelona; Testimonies: between Fiction and Reality, National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece and Manifesta 2, Luxembourg.
His works are in major international collections, including MoMA New York, the Tate, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, Istanbul Modern, Istanbul, the Dimitris Daskalopoulos Collection, Athens and the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh.
Recent and Upcoming Exhibitions
7–29 May 2011, "Mesopotamian Dramaturgies", The Old Municipal Market, Brighton, UK www.brightonfestival.org12 April - 11 September 2011, "Küba", The Luminous Interval D. Daskalopoulus Collection, Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, Spain www.guggenheim-bilbao.es
8 April - 5 June 2011, "Twelve", Tactics of Invisibility, ARTER, Istanbul, Turkey www.arter.org.tr
10 November 2010 - 6 March 2011, The Enemy Inside Me, Istanbul Modern, Turkey
30 May - 12 September 2010, "Mesopotamian Dramaturgies", MAXXI, National Museum of 21st Century Arts, Rome, Italy
13 April - 2 May 2010, "fff", Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK
10 October 2009 - 10 January 2010, Women Who Wear Wigs, Little Theatre of Gestures, Malmö Konsthall, Sweden
1 September 2009 - 31 January 2010, "Küba" and "Paradise", Museum Ludwig, Cologne, Germany
External links
- The Institute for the Readjustment of Clocks - official website on Kutluğ Ataman
- Thomas Dane Gallery, London
- Sammlung Goetz
- Museum of Modern Art, New York
- Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary
- Just Here to Help: Global Art Production and Local Meanings by Matthew StadlerMatthew StadlerMatthew Stadler is a writer and editor who lives in Portland, Oregon. He has written four novels and received several awards and fellowships in recognition of his work. More recently, he has compiled four anthologies about literature, city life and public life...
in FillipFillipFillip is a Vancouver-based contemporary art publishing organization formed in 2004. It publishes a magazine as well as books of critical writing...
Artworks and Filmography
- 2010 Beggars
- 2009 Su
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Journey to the Moon (Feature Film)
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Journey to the Moon (Installation)
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Column
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Dome
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / English as a Second Language
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Frame
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Pursuit of Happiness
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / Strange Space
- 2009 Mesopotamian Dramaturgies / The Complete Works of Shakespeare
- 2007 fff
- 2007 Turkish Delight
- 2007 Circle of Friends
- 2006 Paradise
- 2006 Testimony
- 2006 Lola + Bilidikid (Director's Cut)
- 2005 2 Girls (Feature Film)
- 2004 Stefan's Room
- 2004 Küba
- 2004 Twelve
- 2003 Animated Words
- 2002 It's A Vicious Circle
- 2002 1+1=1
- 2002 99 Names
- 2002 The 4 Seasons of Veronica Read
- 2001 Never My Soul
- 1999 Martin is Asleep
- 1999 Women Who Wear Wigs
- 1998 Lola + Bilidikid (Feature Film)
- 1997 kutlug ataman's semiha b. unplugged
- 1994 Serpent's Tale (Feature Film)
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11668527