Thematic Seminar Cihad Caner

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Thematic Seminar - "Is it possible to talk about power and violence without showing their depictions?" lead by Cihad Caner On-site 03.11 / Online 11. & 18.11 2020]

Image credit: Cihad Caner 2019.


The thematic seminar will question mainstream image-making methods and the dialogues they generate, for and around, socio-political subjects. It intends to challenge the linear, one-sided narrative we are fed by popular media. During the seminars, we will be exploring the politics of the image through different historical and contemporary examples. It will follow an approach that offers to be critical to make sense of “how we comprehend information we receive every day”, to find novel methods and tactics when practicing art related to politics, sociology, and philosophy, to be able to gain response-ability towards the hi(story) and our contemporary time.


The thematic seminar aims to create a base of an understanding of alternative forms of expression on socio-political subjects. The base will help students to merge and incorporate their practice into deeper and wider personal reflections. This seminar series will consist of topical reading groups, reading artworks from various artists and artist talks as well as group critiques.

with guests ONLINE: 18 November 2020

Wendelien van Oldenborgh develops works, whereby the cinematic format is used as a methodology for production and as the basic language for various forms of presentation, collaborating with participants in different scenarios, to co-produce the script. With these works, which look at the structures that form and hinder us, she participated in various large biennials, and in smaller dedicated shows. Recent solo presentations include: tono lengua boca at Fabra i Coats, Barcelona 2020 and CA2M Madrid 2019-20; Cinema Olanda, at the Dutch Pavilion in the 57th Venice Biennial 2017. Van Oldenborgh has exhibited widely including various international Biennials, most recently at the Chicago Architecture Biennial 2019, bauhaus imaginista, HKW Berlin/Zentrum Paul Klee Bern 2019 SALT Istanbul 2020 and In the Presence of Absence, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam 2020.

Van Oldenborgh is a member of the (Dutch) Society for Arts and a recipient of the Dr. A.H. Heineken Prize for Art (2014). A monographic publication, Amateur, was published by Sternberg Press, Berlin; If I Can’t Dance, Amsterdam and The Showroom, London in 2016.


Banu Cennetoğlu lives and works in Istanbul. Cennetoğlu’s work incorporates methods of mapping, collecting and archiving in order to question and challenge the politics of memory, as well as the distribution and consumption of information.

Solo exhibitions include: K21 Ständehaus, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2019); Sculpture Center, New York (2019); Chisenhale Gallery, London (2018); Bonner Kunstverein, Bonn (2015); Salonul de proiecte, Bucharest (2013); Kunsthalle Basel, Basel (2011). Selected group exhibitions to include: Actually, the Dead Are Not Dead, Bergen Assembly 2019; Beautiful world, where are you?, Liverpool Biennale (2018); Documenta 14, Athens and Kassel (2017); The Restless Earth, Fondazione Nicola Trussardi, Milan (2017); 10th Gwangju Biennale (2014); Manifesta 8, Murcia (2010); 53rd Venice Biennale/Pavilion of Turkey (2009); 5th and 3rd Berlin Biennale (2008/2004);1st Athens Biennale (2007) and 10th Istanbul Biennial (2007).

In 2006 she initiated BAS, a project space in Istanbul focusing on collection and production of artists’ books and printed matter. In 2016 she was a guest at the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Program.


Based between Rotterdam and Istanbul, Cihad Caner (b. 1990) works primarily with photography, video, CGI, and sculpture. His work examines quotidian objects and their positioning within the image culture; the portrayal of the “other” in various media; and global urgencies shaped by wars, immigration, and resistance. Caner’s recent work has been exhibited at the Finnish Museum of Photography, Helsinki; the Hong Kong Arts Center; the Art Museum of the Nanjing University of the Arts; the National Gallery of Iceland, Reykjavik; Galerie BOHAI, Hannover; Kasseler Kunstverein; Corridor Project Space, Amsterdam; Blitz Malta, Valletta. Caner has been an artist-in-residence at the ARCUS Project in Moriya (Japan), and received the Mondriaan Fonds Jong Talent grant in 2018. He holds a Master’s in Media Design and Communication from the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam.
www.cihadcaner.com