Hakan Gürsoytrak, 1963

Hakan Gürsoytrak graduated from the Marmara University Faculty of Economic and Administrative Sciences in 1984 and from the fine arts faculty of Mimar Sinan University (Department of Painting) in 1990. He holds a master’s degree in the fine arts from the University of Reading (1993) and completed the masters program at Anadolu University (Institute of Social Sciences) in 1996.

The subjects of Gürsoytrak’s work are everyday or social phenomena such as the relationship between consumer culture and supermarkets, the pop culture lifestyle, the individual’s struggle with systems of power within Turkish society and the tragicomic structure of the relationships between government ministers, business executives, the book-loving people of a Mediterranean village or a crowd in Topkapı Bus Station. These are the small details and stories we come across in newspapers and magazines but fail to really notice or think about. In his paintings and three-dimensional works, Hakan Gürsoytrak points to all socio-cultural relations in Turkey. Adopting a political perspective, he questions the relationships between people and established power structures, our habits of consumerism, the class system and all the information, signs and meanings that make us who we are.