The Kitchen of Gündem
September 2025 - September 2026
BINGOL, ÇANAKKALE, DIYARBAKIR, ISTANBUL
This project is a cultural and social memory project focusing on the women's lives shaped by the Özgür Gündem newspaper, a witness to Turkey's recent history. The newspaper was not only a publication outlet but also a bridge for many women between daily life, information, and society. The stories of Fatma Tandoğan, who worked as a cook in the newspaper's kitchen for 24 years, Fatma Taşlı Tunç, who learned to read and write by reading the newspaper, and women who worked as newspaper distributors in the 1990s will be brought together to create a documentary film centered on issues such as women's labor, transformation, solidarity, and access to information.
Additionally, a meeting will be held in Diyarbakır with women who have contributed to Özgür Gündem over the years, focusing on questions such as, "How does a woman change and become stronger through what she reads in the media?" and "How do women from everyday life describe their experiences and what kind of social visibility do they gain when they create their own narratives?"
Fatma Çelik
Fatma Çelik was born in Diyarbakır in 1987. After graduating from the Department of Psychological Counseling and Guidance at İnönü University in Malatya in 2009, she became interested in photography. Over time, she combined her artistic practice with her pedagogical training, conducting art-based psycho-support work with children and women. Joining the Narphotos photography collective in 2012, she focused on creating a visual archive by following the vibrant agenda of her time and the region she lived in. After Narphotos closed in 2021, she founded the Zîn Collective with the women she worked with in the collective, continuing to create and think alongside women. Working primarily around themes of identity, memory, and ecology, Çelik focuses on her long-term project, Back to Nature, which explores the local context of ecological and racial violence caused by forced migration in recent years. This project explores the ways in which people subjected to this violence struggle and how they rebuild their living spaces.
Connections:
https://fatmacelik.net/
www.instagram.com/fatmacelik_fate
www.instagram.com/healinggarden
This page is published on 22 September 2025.
