İlknur Demirkoparan (b. Ankara Turkiye) is a Turkish-American artist whose research-based interdisciplinary practice spans painting, installation, sculpture, digital media, and creative programming to explore identity and memory through image-making, dissemination, and repetition. She has performed and exhibited her work at the 11th Bucharest Biennial, 7th Berlin Biennial Art Wiki, Migliorisi Foundation (Asuncion), Pyxis (Lausanne) OnCurating Project Space (Zurich), Mark Borghi Fine Art (New York), Highways Performance Space and Gallery (Los Angeles), and FAR Bazaar 2017 (Los Angeles). Her writing appears in ASAP/j, FLAT Magazine, and Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture. She has an MFA in Art from California Institute of the Arts and a BA in Art from the University of California, Riverside. Her recent residencies include the Future Memory Lab at the Migliorisi Foundation in Paraguay with support by ProHelvetia, and ChaNorth, New York. She is the recipient of fellowship awards from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Max H. Gluck Foundation. Demirkoparan is also the founding director of the MinEastry of Postcollapse Art and Culture. She lives and works in Zurich, Switzerland.
CV as pdf below
Education
2006 — MFA, California Institute of the Arts. Valencia, CA, USA
2004 — BA, University of California, Riverside. Riverside, CA, USA
AWARDS & RESIDENCIES
2024 — Residency + Grant. Future Memory Lab. The Migliorisi Foundation, Asunción, Paraguay & Pyxis, Lausannae, Switzerland, with support by ProHelvetia.
2024 — Residency. Loop Art Critique. MUD Foundation. Miami, FL, USA
2021 — Grant. Regional Arts and Culture Council. Portland, OR, USA
Exhibitions
2024 – Sincronia. (curated by Kira Xonorika.) Pyxis Numérique, Lausanne, Switzerland.
2024 – Replay (curated by Vuslat D. Katsanis). The Art Center. Corvallis, Oregon. USA
2024 – Future Perfect (curated by Vuslat D. Katsanis). Durden & Ray. Los Angeles. California, USA.
2024 – Attunement (curated by Kira Xonorika). Pyxis Numérique, Lausanne, Switzerland.
2024 — 11th Bucharest Biennale (BB11). Democracy’s Uncharted Territories (curated by BB11 team and by public vote). Bucharest, Romania.
2024 — [solo] Necessary Retrieve. OnCurating Project Space, Zurich, Switzerland. Curated by Elif Carrier.
2024 — Cerritos Collects: Recent Acquisitions. Cerritos College Art Gallery
Norwalk, California, USA
2023 — [three-person] TRYST! Torrence Art Museum. Los Angeles, CA, USA
2023 — [three-person] Play. MinEastry of Postcollapse Art & Culture. Zurich, CH
2022 — January Group Show: Abstract Selections From 7 Artists. Mark Borghi Fine Art. Sag Harbor. NY, USA
2022 — Abstract Monochrome Figures. Mark Borghi Fine Art. Sag Harbor, NY, USA
ACTIVITIES
2024 – Seminar. “The Necessary Hustle: Funding, Freedom, and the Future of Artist-run Initiatives.” ASAP/15: Not a Luxury. Pratt Institute. New York, NY, USA
2023 — Panel Presentation at ASAP/14: Arts of Fugitivity. University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
2021 — Panel Presentation: “A Practice in Three Parts.” Panel: New Migrancies: Spatial Continuity as Creative Connection. ASAP/12: RECIPROCITY. The Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present 12th Annual Conference. Virtual. New York, USA.
2020 — Panel Presentation: “Collapsing the East/West False Dichotomy: Art as Intervention.” Panel: The MinEastry of Postcollapse Art and Culture: Contemporary Artists and Cultural Workers Networked for Resilience Beyond the Anthropocene. College Art Association 109th Annual Conference. New York, NY.
2019 — Artist Talk, Pine Plains Library, Pine Plains, NY, USA
2019 — Artist Talk with Arzu Arda Kosar and Gul Cagin, The Evergreen State College, WA, USA
PUBLICATIONS
“Demirkoparan, Ilknur & Katsanis, Vuslat D. “The Postcollapse Manifesto.” Flat Journal, UCLA Department of Design Media Arts and the UCLA Arts Conditional Studio. 2023.
“The Postcollapse Life: A Conversation on Creative Resilience Beyond the Anthropocene,” with Ilknur Demirkoparan, Vuslat D. Katsanis, and Mirela Kulovic. Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture. Issue 57, Beyond Post-Humanism. March, 2022. (link)
“How I Arrived Here: An Artist’s Essay, Or A Long-winded Artist’s Statement, Or Possibly Both” Journal of the Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present (ASAP/j). Special Issue on Postcollapse Art: Contemporary Art in ‘the East’ since 1989. Johns Hopkins University Press. December 2021.