The fifth, and the last, session of Değiş Tokuş Talks by photographer and editor İpek Çınar took place on Friday evening of July 16, 2021. The title of Çınar’s talk was ‘Collective structures as spaces of production, solidarity, and learning’. (The talk is in Turkish)

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Çınar launched her discussion by showing a short video shot on the evening of July 1, 2021 at the protests against Turkey’s withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention, which she likened to be a visualization of her feelings toward collective production and solidarity, to focus on the question of what kind of reflections collective production have in Turkey, which gives birth to artistic production on the one hand, and offers a method of resistance to the rules of the market on the other, as a form of solidarity- especially in areas where we have limited opportunities. Çınar continued her presentation with the history of the collectives and culture and art formations in Turkey, which are unique structures with the period, and format they were created in and thanks to their creators by giving examples from formations such as Hafriyat, Oda Proje, Bandrolsüz, GAA. She concluded her speech by detailing the concepts of 'independence', 'organizational forms' and 'economic sustainability' that occupy the dominant narrative among the collectives.

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About İpek Çınar:

Çınar completed her bachelor’s at Middle East Technical University, Department of Political Science. She started her master's degree at the Art in Context Department at UdK Berlin in 2020. Çınar, who has been producing photography-based works since 2011, tells stories expressed in a subjective language by blending writing and photography. Moreover, she conducts interviews and publishes a series of articles on various publications. She also drafts exhibition catalogs and acts as a content consultant, especially on photography. She was invited to participate in guest artist programs, workshops, exhibitions, and festivals in various countries; and gave speeches. Çınar, a member of the International Association of Art Critics-AICA Turkey, has been the co-editor of Orta Format since 2015.