Şule Nur Alev's Editions

"Before starting to work with Derin in the studio, we had a preliminary meeting. During this conversation, we discussed how to establish a genuine collaboration that would allow both of us to test our technical boundaries and result in a project that could be mutually enriching. Following our decision, we spent three full weeks in the studio, producing three etchings. Two of them are part of The Era of the Idler series, one large and one small. The third is a circular composition, a minimal version of my spatial abstractions that possess a certain plastic affinity with the aesthetics of printmaking.​

 

In my practice, I mainly focus on the relationship between space and personal memory. Reflecting on this relationship allows me to uncover mental maps and spatial constructs that are uniquely my own. Through this process, I visualize my memory, consciousness, and ways of thinking as images. Dreams, childhood recollections, habitats from the cities I’ve lived in, and fragments of architecture all these traces from daily life, frequently appear as recurring elements in my works.

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The Era of the Idler is a series composed of images derived from the aesthetics of a computer game I used to play during my childhood. This strategy game represents, in many ways, a condensed version of the real world and of the experience of building a civilization from scratch within a virtual environment. Over time, it has also become a framework for my way of thinking, something I have internalized. The series takes its title from the sheep that wander idle across the surface, despite the game’s ultimate objective. In the compositions, the semi-open and semi-concealed map surfaces of the game are depicted along with these sheep. They are seen moving toward the dark areas of the map known as the “fog of war,” where no information is available. As in my previous works, this series also aims to explore and point beyond the limits of a confined world perception through another intermediary form of expression.

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The circular print, on the other hand, proposes a simplified version of the spheres that I have long revisited, forms with limited movement that can only rotate around their own center of gravity, capable of motion yet somehow restrained. In all three prints, producing the sketches and drawings directly in the studio from the very beginning made my collaboration with Derin all the more productive.’’

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​Şule Nur Alev

2025