Canan, 1970

After graduating from the Business Administration Department at Marmara University in 1992, CANAN began to study art two years later in the painting department at the same university. The artist uses diverse forms of expression, ranging from performance, miniature, and installation to photography, video, and the sheer play of light and shadow.

In her multilayered works, CANAN addresses the theme of women from a feminist perspective, referencing traditional and local culture. She deals with the taboo, harassment, and oppression to which women are subjected in modern society. The artist probes gender politics and their implications, and the fields of power exerted over the female identity and body. Integrating complementary written, oral, and visual histories, she criticizes rigid gender definitions and stereotypes. Also having an interest in stories, tales, and myths that fuel the collective subconscious, the artist incorporates into her works powerful symbols found in oral traditions such as creatures, djinns, fairies, animals, and Shahmaran. Instead of cold, hard facts, CANAN uses a rather ironic language of expression to reflect the bond that she has established with the fictional world.

“Exemplary” is a video tale about a girl in southeastern Anatolia who is “not permitted to be herself, even in her dreams.” In the video, by visually using the miniature, she reawakens a technique associated with Islamic art. CANAN uses this visual language to represent women who are designated as “other” by society, comparing present and past situations of women who are subjected to various forms of oppression by family, religion, society, and the state. The language used and the off-screen sound problematize the typical style of male narrators, taking a critical stance toward the traditionally masculine voice of the storyteller. Through the main character of the story, the video investigates the mechanisms of discipline and control imposed socially on the female body, which is entangled in secular and conservative debates.