CANSU YILDIRAN (1996) live and work in İstanbul.
They are currently an undergraduate student at Marmara University Faculty of Fine Arts Photography Department.
Taking their personal experiences as a reference, they work on matters like belonging and discrimination against class, culture, gender and sexual identity. After their first series ‘The Dispossessed’ which emerges from their family's (hi)story and reveals the inequality of men and women in that society, they worked on a part of Y generation in İstanbul who are affected by both westernization and political atmosphere in Turkey and are creating new lifestyles and establishing spaces where they can live freely but excluded from society. They are now producing audio recordings, videos, and photographs regarding their state of belonging.
Their works have been exhibited at Apartman, İstanbul (2021); Protocinema - Poşe Gallery, İstanbul (2021); The International Queer - Minorities Film Festival, Vienna (2020); Verzasca Foto Festival Awards, Switzerland (2020); Heidelberg Queer Art Festival, Heidelberg (2019); Elgiz Museum, İstanbul (2018); Leica Gallery, İstanbul (2018); Voies Off, Arles (2018); Daire Sanat, İstanbul (2018) and published in British Journal of Photography (2019, 2021); GUP (2021); Dazed Magazine (2019); PH Museum (2019) and Burn Magazine (2018) among many others.
They attended the Noor-Nikon Academy (2021); Transformative Art Project for Activists Residency (2020); World Press Joop Swart Masterclass (2018), are shortlisted for the ICP / GOST First Photo Book Award (2020) and PHMuseum Photography Grant (2021), and are the winner of the category Resisting of the first-ever All Out & MTV Photo Award (2021).
They are represented by The Empire Project, İstanbul and an affiliate of PLATFORM by GAPO.
