Shattering Silence

Eylem Delikanli

This installation is a part of Listening Through Time and Place: An Interactive Oral History Exhibit, OHMA's multimedia interactive popup exhibition of stories, which will take place at the Social Hall at Union Theological Seminary on April 28, 2016 at 5:00 pm.

In a collaborative effort, a collage of artist Aylin Tekiner’s work will be presented with Eylem Delikanli's oral history interview that will elaborate her life starting from the assassination of her father in 1980 in Turkey. Silence as a theme emerges in her life story and defines her artistic work. As a member of the 1.5 generation Aylin shattered her silence, resulting in impressive artistic work.

Aylin Tekiner is a New York/Istanbul based artist and activist. She undertook her B.A. and M.A. at Hacettepe University Fine Arts, Sculpture Department in Ankara, Turkey. In 2008 she received her PhD at Ankara University, Institute of Educational Sciences, Cultural Fundamentals of Education Department. Her book “Ataturk Statues: Cult, Esthetics, and Politics” evolved from her PhD thesis and was published by İletişim Yayınları (Turkey) in 2010. Aylin has had solo shows and participated in group exhibitions in Turkey and New York. She taught New Media, Art, and Activism at Long Island University, New York. She is a member of Collective Memory Platform, which was formed by the families of 28 victims of the political murders in modern Turkey as well as Çocuklarız Bir Aradayız initiative that focuses on the 1980 Coup D’État. She is a special research fellow at Yale School of Drama.

Eylem Delikanli is an independent researcher and a writer. She holds an MA in Sociology specializing in the sociology of communication. She is the co-author of the book Keşke Bir Öpüp Koklasaydım (with Ozlem Delikanli in Turkish, Istanbul: Ayrıntı Yayınları September 2013), a work of oral history about the 1980 Coup D’État in Turkey. Her current research as a sequel focuses on the political refugees living in Europe and North America after the Coup. She is the contributing writer for an upcoming book on authoritarianism in Turkey. She is a founding member of Research Institute on Turkey (RITurkey.org) - a grassroots research cooperative based in NY focusing on commonization practices for social change in Turkey. Eylem is also a member of Çocuklarız Bir Aradayız initiative – a group working towards building a collective memory of 1980 Coup D’État in Turkey. She is a Tunisian Transition Oral History Project fellow at INCITE / Columbia University. As an oral historian, Eylem’s work focuses on theories of post memory, collective memory, authoritarianism and silence.