Özcan Uzkur

Özcan Uzkur’s artistic practice does not confine itself to a specific aesthetic discipline; rather, it creates multilayered narratives based on characteristics such as flexibility, transformation, and permanence. The artist employs his material not merely as a surface, but as a narrative tool. By intervening in the material through processes such as burning, pressing, cutting, and wearing down, Uzkur expresses both his personal experiences and the universal human condition. Material becomes both an artistic and socio-political vehicle of expression in Uzkur’s aesthetic approach. The color red, which Uzkur uses predominantly in his works, possesses a representational language historically and culturally symbolizing pain, resistance, violence, and struggle. Representing dynamic power and internal movement, red symbolizes the tragedy of humanity beginning with original sin, as well as the lasting traces of this sin. It is a symbol expressing the sense of guilt brought by original sin, egocentric desires, and a powerful objection.

(b. 1952, Balıkesir) Özcan Uzkur graduated from the Textile Arts Department of the State School of Applied Fine Arts (M.S.U.F.A.) in 1978. Having served as a faculty member in the Textile Arts Department of Marmara University Faculty of Fine Arts between 1982 and 2011, Özcan Uzkur is currently a faculty member at Istanbul Topkapı University Faculty of Fine Arts. The artist, who has conducted national and international workshops, participated in numerous exhibitions and projects, and held solo exhibitions, lives and works in Istanbul.