Conversation with Ebru Özseçen, Istanbul , 2005

In this conversation, Ebru Özseçen reflects on her transition from architecture to multidisciplinary art. After completing her architectural studies, she became a fellow at the Rietveld Academy in 1997 and later engaged with art institutions across Europe. Her early interest in the built environment, social topography, and gender evolved into a distinctive artistic practice encompassing video, installations, drawings, and sculptural objects—often rooted in material experimentation and bodily form.

Özseçen discusses how growing up in a male-dominated environment shaped her feminist consciousness. While she appreciates the historical role of feminism, she questions its personal relevance: “I believe in universal conditions. There must be optimum conditions in the 21st century so we can go for other solutions than going back to history. But I adore feminism and how modern movements and international style happened.”

Her installations and photographs often address gender through spatial experience, incorporating architectural principles such as pelvic height. Özseçen emphasizes the significance of site-specific installations, particularly in underrepresented or forgotten urban areas, including a conceptual intervention for Istanbul’s historic metro tunnel: “I work with the facades, interior and exterior. And I wanted to use chrome nickel, which is a very domestic material… So I can extend these buildings to somewhere else and the other way around.”

Özseçen recalls being drawn to new parts of Istanbul after years of familiarity with only certain “approved” cultural areas, underscoring how physical access and visibility shape creative engagement: “How can I define a territory, a kind of place to meet each other?” Her projects often address emotional and collective memory, such as at the 2000 Limerick Biennial, where she collaborated with teenagers to plant 4,000 violets in response to local sexual abuse cases.

Özseçen also touches on how being Turkish and a woman has shaped her career. While she hasn’t faced direct gender discrimination, she has been tokenized due to her nationality. She stresses the need for genuine cross-cultural understanding over performative inclusion: “[In Istanbul] we have four religions. I am proud to be part of that mosaic. I think everybody has to learn more from history, because this kind of disrepect happened somewhere [before]. And it has opened some wounds in everybody’s body, but if everybody reads and tries to understand each other…”