"...Filmlerdeki gibiydi buluşma ağır çekim
İzledi sahneyi sincap, kartal ve kirpi
Ayın on dördünü beklemeden doğuvermiş mehtap
Cırcır böcekleri bülbüller şırıl şırıl akan dere
Enderunda uyuyadursun ut, tambur, kemançe ve kanun
Damat İbrahim’in meşhur düğünü kaç para!
Hesapsız kitapsız bir deli sevdaya
Alkış tutuyor toprak, su ve rüzgar
Süleyman kucakladığı an Hurrem’i
İlk defa sahicikten (ama kısacık bir an)
Cihan padişahlığı neymiş, bildi..."

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"nihori in may and in july", pen on A4 paper, 2010

for the group exhibition "Park: bir ihtimal" curated by Can Altay

"...Geçmişe bakmak, sadece onu özlemek, döndürülemeyecek bir zamana bugün sahip olmanın fantezisi üzerinden kendini hırpalamak anlamına gelmemeli. Oykut, “Nihori'de Mayıs ve Temmuz” isimli iki parçalı işinde bize bunu göstermeye niyetli: Çocukluğundaki komşu bostanların bozulup, yerine -trajik olaylarla- yapılan villalara rağmen Nihori'deki (Yeniköy) sokağı hâlâ güzel. “Temmuz'da Nihori”deki havuz inşaatında eğlenen işçiler bu umudun işareti. Tabii kaderci bir bekleyiş önermiyor. Umudun olduğuna inanıp -o doğrultuda- icabında sınırları, bariyerleri hiçe sayarak yaşamayı yansıtıyor."

Can Altay

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drawings for Radikal newspaper 2010

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" In courtesy of World Pieces Museum, 3010"

drawings on A4 paper for the group exhibition "Diverçity, Learning from Istanbul"

curated by Serra Özhan and Kaja Pawelek, Warshaw, Poland, 2010

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"Istanbul Zombi 2066" comicbook project by Mery Cuesta

colaboration with Tan Cemal Genç, Göksu Gül, Cem Dinlenmiş, Emir Yardımcı

Istanbul-Barcelona, 2009

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"Tsunami" wall paintig, 17 x 5 m

"Le Spectacle Du Quotidien", Biennale De Lyon, curated by Hou Hanru, Lyon, France, 2009

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"Adventures of the Water and the Earth"

serial of A4 drawings for the group exhibition "Quel Istanbul?"

curated by François Saint Pierre, Centre De Photographie De Lectoure, France, 2009

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" Tout Va Bien"

collage made out of children's drawings.

workshop with children for the exhibition "i dream but.."/apartment project (selda asal, ceren oykut, serdar ateşer)

supported by Lille 3000, Maison Folie Moulins De Lille, Lille, France, 2009

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drawings for the visitor guide of the exhibition "Istanbul Traverseé", Lille, France, 2009

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"Please, Help Yourself" window installation

"Istanbul Traverseé"

group exhibition curated by Caroline Naphegyi

Palais Des Beaux Arts De Lille, Lille France, 2009

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"Orijinal, Altyazısız" solo exhibition, artSümer gallery, Istanbul, 2010

Perde kalktığında gördüğüm manzara bambaşkaydı.

Başka bir ülkeye taşınmış gibiydim.

Burada konuşulan dili anlayamıyordum ve gözlerim iyi görememeye başlamıştı.

Şimdi buradayım, çok aşağıda ve çok yukarıdayım.

Görebildiğim kadarını seyrettim, seyrettiğim kadarını gösterdim. Kazı henüz bitmedi, karşınızdaki hala benimle…

Ceren Oykut, Istanbul, 2010

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Lost Passport, solo exhibition, Kibla, Maribor, Slovenia 2008

Ceren Oykut proudly presents her one-year Schengen visa on her lost passport.

The persistent feeling of trespassing would not fade away. Yet, the riotous will to discover new lands and to explore different lives is always at stake.

The more it becomes unreachable, the more you insist: New rules. New obligations. Additional documents. Further verifications. More questions. More legality. More reliable proof. A constant state of claiming your decency: all in all, you simply want to go to another land, not commit a crime.

In the atlas of concealed lands, your voyage starts with daydreaming. Impossible lands with fictive characters and never-ending adventures shape your dreams with overlapping stories waiting to be told. To be in command of these passionate dreams, all you need is a visa on your passport. Some brave and lucky dreamers have managed to obtain it before, that we know. An artist girl worked hard for this: it is said that her dreams have exceeded her maps and that she has been searching for ways to control these maps. Then, she was invited here to exhibit these maps.

Now, she also has to prove that she is in control of the situation.

Even so, Ceren Oykut proudly presents her one-year Schengen visa on her lost passport.

Basak Senova, Istanbul, 2008

City Can/ Istanbul 2006

City Can is dealing with Istanbul as a city of dreams and nightmares. It goes beyond traditional drawing by extending the picture into space. The work surrounds the spectator. It shows a heterogeneous urban cosmos, in which millions of stories can be observed. Instead of being a wall-drawing, the work is a space-drawing, a time and site spesific installation.

Ceren Oykut transfers the classic medium into contemporary forms in order to adjust the act of drawing to today’s reality. She poses the eyes of a child combined with the mind of a scientist. The artist researches Istanbul and reveals the stories of the city dwellers living within the chaos and absurdity of everyday life. Ceren Oykut belongs to this city, is an active part of it.

City Can functions like a subjective archive, a visual pool of the streets of Istanbul. The artist draws what she sees. The result is an all over composition, a complex structure without any focus. Like the city itself, there is no centre in Oykut’s work. She creates an individual map, in which details are more important than a general impression, a picturesque wiew or any tourist attraction.

Turkis Miniature as well as caricature, satire and humour in general (mizah) have evident influences on her work. On the walls of Under Construction, she individually reproduces her direct surrounding, the urban context she lives in. Though, different from real life, in Oykut’s work, everything and every being have same formal and conceptual importance. The freedom of miniature is adjusted to the freedom of the mind.

City Can translocates parts of Istanbul into Under Constuction. In the installation, the spectator sees scenes that Ceren Oykut watched on her way from Boyacıköy, over Başiktaş, the Bosphorus, Kadıköy to Under Construction in Maltepe during the installation’s production time of three weeks. The work is like a record of seen incidents, which she saved in her memory and later drew on the wall. She took various ways to the exhibition space to see as many different stories as possible. The result of this research is a compressen image of Istanbul. There, everything is in a state of permanent flux. The city, the construction site and Oykut’s installation are constantly developing. Together they form one liquid composition. İt resembles a concert, in which the sound of Istanbul gets created: The machines of the construction site form the rhythm, and the pencil dances an the walls to the melody of the city.

In City Can, time and space stop existing. The spectator steps out of real life in order to discover Istanbul. Therefore, Oykut’s work shows one of art’s basic functions:Art becomes an instrument for researching and questioning society by forming parallel realities which represents models of our world. In her installation, we see our city through the eyes of somebody who is observing from a differet angle.

Ceren Oykut’s work reflects the paradox of being a distant observer and individual activist. City Can gives us a feedback. What we see is what we live with. The spectator is wellcomed to enter the installation in order to discover various faces of Istanbul, this beautiful monster. Istanbul is more than an accumulation of concrete, steel and glass. Istanbul is made by its inhabitants. We create Istanbul everyday new...

Marcus Graf, Istanbul, 2006