Side by Side by Burcu Büyükünal and Selen Özus

Artist list

Burcu Büyükünal, Selen Özus

Let It...,  Burcu Büyükünal
Let it exist, let it cease, let it come, let it go, let it stay, let it appear, let it conceal, let it decay, let it split, let them gather, let it unite, let it be remembered, let it be forgotten, let it out, let it in, let it get lost, let it be found, let it become ugly, let it turn beautiful…
Let it… is a work that began to appear in my mind when I lost myself in the details of Abel Mort sculpture by Emile Feugère des Fort in Musée d’Orsay. It emerges from these details and changes its direction under the influence of the natural and obligatory course of life. It is fiction but it is real.

The Closest, Selen Özus
My autoportrait works entitled “The closest” are the products of an interpretive process of visualizing myself which resulted in conflicts and clashes.The period started with shut-eye drawings: My white on white faces only to reveal themselves with a closer look, are chosen to define myself. Porcelaine works emerged as the variable reflections of transparent and delicate materials gone with the flow.

Biography:
Having graduated from Industrial Design Department of Istanbul Technical University in 2003, Burcu Büyükünal started to work at Ela Cindoruk and Nazan Pak’s jewellery studio. After receiving Fulbright Award she got her MFA in Metal at SUNY at New Paltz in 2009. She confounded Maden Contemporary Jewelry Studio in 2011 with Selen Özus. Currently, she teaches classes at Maden, İTÜ and Plato Higher College of Education.
 
Artist Statement:
Among my works, there are designed products along with functional and nonfunctional, artistic and arbitrary pieces that I cannot classify. Contemporary jewellery, which is my main field, comes and goes between these two related disciplines, stands closer to one of them time to time. I sometimes focus on a technique, a material or a visual data around me and create links among them while revealing my own point of view. I crave to ask uncommon questions and find alternative answers to them. Even though I enjoy sticking to my habits in the process of creation, I find theme shifts nourishing and exciting. I believe creating and making is a childlike addiction. That’s why my studio is my living room.
 
Selen Özus Biography:
Selen Özus was born in 1983 in Istanbul, where she continues to live and work. She got her BFA in Ceramic and Glass Design in Mimar Sinan Fine Art University, followed by a three year Jewellery Program in Alchimia Contemporary Jewellery School in Florence where she took classes from Peter Bauhuis, Manfred Bischoff and Ruudt Peters.  Her work has been exhibited locally and internationally. She teaches at the Maden Contemporary Jewellery Studio, she co-founded with Burcu Büyükünal.
 
Artist Statement:
It all starts with the valuable beauties and ugliness’ that surround us: People, being human, lights, spaces, relations, memories, nature and details.The sensations created by everybody and everything awaken a desire to produce.In fact, all shapens up while paying gently attention to the details. From then on my sole aim is to retreat to my secured world and to concretize what I see with my feelings… to reflect the combination of brain and heart. While producing, drawings become objects, objects become art jewellery. Once my strong feelings balanced, the rest passes to the piece.