ÜLKÜ  Q  ÇAĞLAYAN               WORKS                    
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  • Recently published performance book, Making Sense: purchase here
    “Making Sense” performans kitabını buradan satın alabilirsin.


  • New Social Dreaming Matrix on the 5th of November, 2022 @ Online
    “Social Dreaming Matrix” yeni serisi 26 Ocak’ta başlıyor.


For all inqiuiries, please contact
Benimle iletişime geçmek için

caglayan.ulku@gmail.com




MA, Contemporary Art Practice
2022-2023 Royal College of Art

Select Group Shows
2021 Mamut Art Project  

Self-organized exhibition
2020 Modes of Encounter

Events & Seminars
2020 Working In the Unthought Known: The Octopus and Her Tentacles, Social Dreaming Matrix Seminar, The Laboratory for Social Choreography at Duke University, in partnership with the Centre for Social Dreaming

2018-2019 Definition of Art Group, Conceptual Art Event, İstanbul

2017-2018 Definition of Art Group, Conceptual Art Event,  İstanbul

Education
2020 Site-Specific Performance Research Program, Six Weeks, Performance Art Studies

2018-2019 Guest Student, Koc University, Fall Semester Year, İstanbul, Course: Brain and Behaviour

2018-2019 Guest Student, Koc University, Fall Semester Year, İstanbul, Course: Personality Theories

2017-2018 Guest Student, Koc University, Spring Semester Year, İstanbul, Course: Physical Theatre,

2017-2018 Guest Student, Koc University, Spring Semester Year, İstanbul, Course: Introduction to Cognitive Science

2010-2011 University of Arts London, Design Management, A Year Program, London

2009 B.A., Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Semester Year Exchange Program, Barcelona

2009 B.A., London College of Economics and Political Science, Short-term Exchange Program, London

2005-2010 B.A., Koç University, İstanbul

Movement Research and Body-Breath-work
2012-... Independent Breath & Movement Researcher & Practitioner

2018 Shamanic Improvisation Potential with Keith Hennessy, ImpulsTanz, Vienna

2018 Provocation X Care with Keith Hennessy, ImpulsTanz, Vienna

2018 Somatic Movement Teacher Training part 1 with Dieter Rehberg, ImpulsTanz, Vienna

2018  Physical Theatre Course with
Bedirhan Dehmen

2017 Body-Focused Art with Tuğçe Tuna [simultaneously with 'Portfolio Design, Presentation, Criticism' course], Nesin Mathematics Village, Şirince

2016  The Ricean School of Dance with the organising team working under the guidance of Vitoria Kotsalou, Hydra Island, Greece

Experiences
2013-2019 Circuit İstanbul, A Not-for-profit Arts and Culture Organisation, Co-Founder

Circuit related Talks and Participation
2019 Guest at “Green Strategies” class with another member from Sustainable Fashion Platform at MEF University, with lecturer Nazlı Ödevci

2017 Guest at a class with a focusing theme of “change”. Visual Story Telling course at Bilgi University, with lecturer Gökhan Eryaman.

2017 Circuit  Presentation about Alternative Uses of Space, Department of Architecture Bilgi University, Istanbul

2017 Circuit  Participation at Çevre Festivali (Environment Festival), organised by Municipality of Kadıköy.

2016 Circuit  Participation at Güzel Bir Gün Festival as one of the social responsible projects.

2016 Circuit  Talk for PAWI, Professional American Women in Istanbul with the co-founder of CIRCUIT, Jessica Sim

Voluntary and Community-based Work
2017-2019 Sustainable Fashion Platform is a social & environmental impact initiation with the ultimate purpose of transforming the fashion and textile ecosystem in Turkey with a sustainability focus. It has eleven other founding members including Ülkü Çağlayan.









My practice engages in performative studies, social choreographic practices and writing.
I am primarily interested in the types of knowledge or understanding which is not reducible to language; yet sensible, unthought-of; yet known.
This may be through collective experimentation or research-creation working with different practices both linguistic and non-linguistic (movement, breath, embodied interaction).
I use these experiences as a medium in itself and my thinking is inspired by the ideas in neuroscience.
I’d like to write poems in order to think.

My work explores different ways of sense-making and thinking, such as rhizomatic or nomadic thinking.

I host “Social Dreaming Matrix”—a practice on the shared unthought knowledge—to cultivate free associations and systemic thinking, so as to create links, find connections, and generate new thoughts.


My Personal History
Lucky by birth; has been raised with contradictions, love and bravery.
Had an irrelevant educational life that I could never live through.
Intellectual processes such as contemplating, analysing, questioning, writing, as well as (night-time) dreaming and exploring their relationship to each other have been my favoured activities.


Change 1 In 2012, encountered a breath-and-mind method while pursuing my curiosity on the concept of self [who am I].
Started flirting with the change while being trained within the breath facilitation/ mind coaching.
A compelling interest in understanding the human mind and the meaning of change has arisen. A process of divesting oneself of the old one has begun.

For about 3 years, I devoted my life to breath and body practices and travelled with the community I was part of. I gravitated towards raising psychological questions, retrospectives and communication without words.


Change 2 In 2013, during my travels encountered permaculture principles in South Africa.
In December 2013, I founded Circuit with an eagerness to represent the possibility of change.


Change 3 In June 2015, wanted to know what art was.
Since then, I continue my studies through performative researches, alternative educational centres, and institutions to inquiry into the fields of movement, performance art, and cognitive science.

During this time, my artistic ideas have been triggered by dancers and philosophers such as Keith Henessey and Erin Manning.

In 2019, I applied to a few MA programs in performance art yet ended up home-schooling myself with a promise to tangiblize my ideas in the form of an exhibition within a year.
I don’t think I will ever graduate from my home school.


Works I’ve done in the past and can always do as side works: simultaneous translation, writing, proofreading, translation and costume styling ( :

CV