Here and Now!

“Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.” — Albert Einstein

About the Biennial / Here and Now

The Istanbul Children and Youth Art Biennial has been held since 2010 in Istanbul, a city home to 3 million children and young people under the age of 18. It is Türkiye’s largest art event for children and young people living both in Türkiye and abroad.

The biennial sets out to explore and reflect on creativity in depth. For the development of future generations, it is more important today than ever that children learn, as they grow up, to value visual aesthetics and to create aesthetically. The biennial gives children and young people the opportunity to make art in different media, and in this way also aims to help children make themselves visible by sharing their experiences. As well as including disciplines such as painting, drawing, printmaking and sculpture, it makes room for time-based approaches using film, sound, performance, theatre and music.

The theme of the 5th Biennial, to be held in 2018, is HERE AND NOW! Artworks created on this theme will be exhibited and/or performed at various venues across Istanbul between 19 April and 23 May 2018.

HERE AND NOW! What does it mean to be in this moment and in this place? Sometimes we can look around us and notice what our life looks like here and now. Does the daily life you see reflect your own personal world? Can you be somewhere else at the same time, in your mind or in the virtual world? Can we look inside or outside ourselves? Are the past and the future tied to a person’s own experiences? How do we perceive time? Or is it an illusion? Is living only in the moment irresponsible or careless? Do the value we place on nature and our strong bond with it remind us of its importance in our lives? How do you think children and young people all over the world experience being HERE and NOW!?

In every biennial exhibition, one week is dedicated to Children’s Rights, and a series of hands-on workshops, live performances, meetings, discussions and seminars take place throughout the biennial month.

We welcome all children and young people who use every kind of medium with a creative mind and share the journey of HERE and NOW!

Curators of the 2018 biennial: Leyla Sakpınar, Özgür Yener, Kader Akçay and Fırat Bingöl