Guerilla Workers & Gezi Movements In Turkey

Exhibited at “Transformation des Geschehens”, Artist in Residency of Shedhalle Tübingen

27.05-22.06.2013, Tübingen (Germany)

”My research project´s main topic was based on the ´guerilla workers`, this is how I called the street vendors of Istanbul. The street vendors/´guerilla workers` are arriving, when there is a need, e.g. when it is raining there are selling umbrellas. I connected this topic with the Gezi movement in Turkey. My research during the Artist In Residency of the Shedhalle Tübingen, Germany was about, how these revolutionary happenings in Turkey effected or created new products of the ´guerilla workers`. For me it seemed to be also a “Transformation of occasion/Transformation des Geschehens”.

Street vendors, which are an important pillar of the informal economy in Turkey, do not exist in Germany. For this reason, Beser took place in Tübingen Square like a street vendor. He used the Vandetta mask, one of the iconic masks of the Gezi movements in Turkey, and sold the fanzine that he produced in the artist program, like a street vendor.