Can Akgümüş

Can Akgümüş uses photography as a material in his artistic production, considering it as a tool for capturing visible reality and reproducing it through its relationships with memory, history, and society. By applying various collage, exposure, and scanning techniques, he explores the boundaries of photography while focusing on the creation of images. In his works, he addresses practices of memory, recollection, and forgetting, as well as the natural cycle of life and its effects on individuals, using a distanced and interpretative perspective. Through these observations, he searches for new ways to connect his personal memory with the collective memory. Akgümüş’s first photography book, Öteki Bosna (The Other Bosnia), earned him first place in the 3rd International Bursa Photofest Dummy Competition in 2013 and was subsequently published.

His first solo exhibition, Yutulmuş (Swallowed), was held at Artnivo Project Space in Istanbul in 2016. His second solo exhibition, Terminal, was opened in 2021 at Kurşunlu Han in Istanbul and later moved to KA’s exhibition space in Ankara in 2022. In the same year, Akgümüş held his third solo exhibition, Great Dream, at KAIROS Gallery in Istanbul, supported by the CultureCivic Arts Production Fund.

At the beginning of 2024, he co-hosted a duet exhibition titled Silhouettes of Time: The Transient Grace of Vanishing Keepsakes with Ümmühan Yörük at Barın Han in Istanbul. Can Akgümüş, a member of AICA Turkey, lives and works in Istanbul and Ankara.