CIHAN ÇAKMAK
We are delighted to have realised several projects with the artist and photographer Cihan Çakmak (born 1993; lives and works in Berlin) since 2025.
In her work, Çakmak explores different aspects of origin and identity, particularly in the context of her own German-Kurdish background, which is characterised by a critical dialogue between tradition and self-discovery. Through performative photographic self-portraits, gestural depictions of female protagonists, video installations, drawings, and texts, she explores moments of distance and proximity, emancipation and heteronomy — always within the liminal field of tension between belonging and demarcation.
We would be happy to send you further information upon request:
berlin@eigen-art.com
Academic Education:
2021-2023 Meisterschülerin (master student) by Prof. Tina Bara, Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, Leipzig
2021 Diploma, Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst, Leipzig
2019 Course at the International Center of Photography, New York City, USA
2017 – 2021 Photography Studies at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig, in the class Klasse of Tina Bara
2016- 2017 Studies at the IADE-Creative University, Lissabon, Portugal
2015- 2023 Scholarship of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung
2015 Artist Residence in Marrakesch, Marocco
Exhibitions and scholarships/grants (selection):
2026
Haus am Kleistpark, Solo exhibition, Berlin, Germany
Museum Morsbroich, Solo exhibition, Leverkusen, Germany
2025
November Art Cologne with Galerie EIGEN + ART, Germany
Rizzuto Gallery, Then I Decided To Be Free, Solo exhibition, Palermo, Italy
Künstlerhaus Bethanien+ Haus 1, Group show, Berlin, Germany
Bookrelease von“Ez fraktal” erstererster Berlin, 04.03.2025 mit SHIFT BOOKS, Germany
EIGEN+ART Lab, Into the void, Solo exhibition, Berlin, Germany
Photography from Leipzig, Freunde Aktueller Kunst E.V., Group show, Zwickau, Germany
DIE GROSSE NRW, Düsseldorf, Germany
2024
Kulturbunker Köln, Queerreality, Group show, Cologne, Germany
Berlinskej Model, Forest Families, Group show, Prague, Czech Republic
Mouches Volantes, the opposite is connection, Solo show, Cologne, Germany
Kunstverein Hildesheim + Literaturhaus St. Jakobi, Which photo looks at you?, Group show, Hildesheim (DE), Germany
Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig, Tenseness, Leipzig, Germany
WOD, Kunsthaus Dresden, Dresden, Germany
2023
November Blicke Filmfestival, Preisträgerin des Hauptpreises: Ein-Blicke Preis, Bochum, Germany
Nominated Villa Aurora L.A., USA
Nominated C/O Berlin Talent Award, Germany
2022
Nominated Arendt Preis ( EMOP ), Germany
Nominated Wüstenrot Dokumentar Fotopreis, Germany
Nominated Rainer Wild Kunstpreis, Germany
2021
Diploma Ausstellung, HGB Leipzig, Rössing-Preis für Fotografie, Germany
Nominated Amadeu Antonio Preis, Germany
2020
Winner of the Paula Modersohn-Becker Newcomer Kunstpreis, Barkenhoff, Worpswede, Germany
Bundeskunsthalle, Fragments from now, Group show, Bonn, Germany
Cooperations with EIGEN + ART (selection):
2026
Solo exhibition, Galerie EIGEN + ART, Berlin, Germany
2025
Into the void, solo exhibition, EIGEN + ART LAB, Berlin, Germany
New Positions, solo presentation, Galerie EIGEN + ART / Art Cologne, Germany
How old is your body? Do you have your grandmother’s hair and your father’s lips? How old are the words they form? Which sentences longed to drift away even before you spoke them? How much does your hand know that you only have a hint of? How old is your hand, like your sister’s? How many words slipped away before this single flick of the tongue?
Pain older than the body around which it wraps like the branches of a juniper tree. Look how it grows, solitary on its mountainside. It has risen over decades from the rocky ground, even before a name was invented for it. Before the urge for order gave rise to more and more chaos.
Your name speaks of her, of this one world and this time that knows no separation or order: no fields or nations, no women or men, no knowledge or forgetfulness. Your name speaks of a time that never was, but which could be in the next moment.
They carry the boulders away one by one, and yet the rock remains. They say: With every birth, a new world begins. But you remember your grandmother’s hair, how it shimmered beneath the scarf like your mother’s, like yours, like mine, like ours. Water can only be spilled when one tries to catch it; likewise, silence can only be heard when it is broken.
How old is your body with your father’s lips and your sister’s hands, and a back so curved that not a single stone remains standing behind it? No matter how far you travel, this curve will always be older than you could ever know.
Asal Dardan, March 2025
Collections (selection):
Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig, Germany
Galerie für Zeitgenössische Kunst Leipzig,Germany
Kunstpalast Düsseldorf, Germany
Museum Morsbroich Leverkusen Germany
Arendt Collection Luxembourg, Luxembourg
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Germany
Landkreis Osterholz/ Worpsweder Museen, Germany
Kunstsammlung der Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung e.V. Bonn, Germany
Publications (selection):
Akademie Management und Politik, Andiwonder, And She was like: Bäm!, ArtAsyl-Present Magazine, Cammerspiele Leipzig, Eye_Land, Fluter, Focus Magazine, Forum Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung / Summerschool, Frére Music, Hanser Literaturverlage, Interaction Leipzig, Kaltblut Magazine, Kunstverein 68elf Köln (Menschenräume), Kunst+Unterricht, Leipziger Schriften, Medusablätter, Missy Magazine, Monopol Magazine, Philosophie Magazin, Ramp english/german Magazine, Renk. Magazine, Renk. online, RollingStone, Series:be, Der Spiegel, Upgration, Vice/i-D, Zeit Campus, Zeit (Magazine) and more
