Festival Meandros Team
Artistic Directors
Born in Istanbul, Cem Mansur studied at London’s City University, Guildhall School of Music and Drama where he obtained the Ricordi Conducting Award, and later at the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute where he became a pupil of Leonard Bernstein. Mansur served as the principal conductor of the Istanbul State Opera and Ballet between 1981 and 1989. Making his London debut with the English Chamber Orchestra in 1985, Mansur then concentrated his work abroad. Performing as a guest conductor with the symphony and opera orchestras in Holland, France, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Hungary, Germany, Sweden, Spain, Mexico, Israel and Russia, the Maestro held the post of principal conductor at the Oxford City Orchestra from 1989 to 1996. In 1998, he became the permanent conductor of the Akbank Chamber Orchestra.
Giving many concerts with some of the most preminent soloist of the world, Maestro Cem Mansur in the recent years has been frequently conducting the Kirov Opera, Royal Philharmonic, London Mozart Players, City of London Sinfonia, BBC Concert Orchestra, George Enescu Philharmonic, Concerto Grosso Frankfurt, Prague National Theatre, Mexico City Philharmonic and at the London Holland Park Opera Festival where he is invited every summer.
CEM MANSUR
Conductor, Music Director of Akbank Chamber Orchestra
Dırector of Musica Meandrum
He is a founder member of Ankara Photographers Association and the Photography Foundation; and the creative director for Turkey of the World Press Photo. His books Journey in Fas, Yellow Bus 1- Iran Wooden Lantern, Yellow Bus 2- Pakistan Blue Desert, Yellow Bus 3- India Namaste, and Yellow Bus 4- on the Skirts of Nepal Sagarmatha won much acclaim from public and press. He wrote documentary manuscripts for Turkish Radio and Television. He opened individual and joint exhibitions entitled Lice, To Live 1- It Wasn’t the Earthquake Which Hit Me – Muradiye, To Live 2- Hail O’ Creator – Strike, Faces of Heraklea, Özcan Yurdalan Photography Exhibition, Asia, Story of the River Fırat, About GAP (Southeast Anatolia Project), and Baghdad – Babel – Karbala February 2003.
OZCAN YURDALAN
Photographer, Writer
Moderator of Meandros Photography Camp
Sculpturing since 1987, Nilhan Sesalan completed her masters degree at the Mimar Sinan Fine Arts Faculty Sculpture Department in the Atelier of Ali Teoman Germener (Alos). She opened exhibitions and participated at symposiums in Germany, Japan, Greece, Romania, Finland, France and throughout Turkey. She worked as an art director in many documentaries, movies and TV series. Her project “Residing in Istanbul – Duplex Chair with Blue Fish” was elected the design of the year at Istanbul Design Week 2005. Since the year 2000, she has adopted in principle the idea “in the relation of a leaf and a tree, a leaf is a leaf but nevertheless the tree as well” and believing that the “piece” is the “whole”, she has created also the “alternatively chosen” with the leftover pieces of her sculptures. She continues her works at her atelier in Kuzguncuk, Istanbul.
NILHAN SESALAN
Sculptor
Director of Didyma International Stone Sculpture Symposium
She studied history of art at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University between 1997 and 2001, after which she started her postgraduate education at the same university in Art History Department Western and Contemporary Arts Section. Between 2001 and 2004, she worked as the coordinator for the Mozart Days and Bach Days. In 2004, Kamacı completed her postgraduate degree with her research on “The Relation of Psychiatry and Art within the Context of Suleyman Velioglu and Akatunyel Arts Group”. During her researches, she attended the theoretical and practical activities of the Art Therapy Education Group at the Istanbul University Psychiatry Clinic Social Psychiatry Service. Basak Kamacı continues her researches on Psychopathological Art, Usage of Art in Psychotherapy, The Artistic Productions of Psychiatric Patients; and she delivers speeches on the topic at various conferences, panels and discussions.
BASAK KAMACI
Art Historian
General Director of Festival Meandros
Coordinators
He was born in Izmit, 1960. He completed elementary and secondary education in Istanbul, graduating from Kadıköy Anatolian High School in 1979. He completed his degree in Art Education at Mimar Sinan University in 1984; obtained his masters in History at Bosphorus University in 1987 and his PhD in Art History at Mimar Sinan University in 1994.
He entered the advertisement and PR sector in 1984 and in 1996 he left it to become a professor at Mimar Sinan University. During his academic career he had articles published on late period Ottoman architecture, architecture of the Republic period, and on preserving the historical and natural environment. He served as a member and vice chairman on the Cultural and Natural Heritage Protection Board. He undertook the post as court expert in cases regarding the Law No.2863 on the Protection of Cultural and Natural Heritage. He has lectured on historical and natural environmental researches, archive sources in Ottoman architecture, Ottoman and Turkish architecture during the westernisation and Republic periods, Western art terminology and research methods, industrial revolution and its reflections in art, art history historiography, and on general art history at diploma and postgraduate levels. He has directed diploma and postgraduate researches.
Currently Sinan Guler continues his academic and administrative duties along with his educational activities as a professor in Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Science and Literature Faculty Art History Department.
Assistant Professor Dr. A. SINAN GULER
Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Science and Literature Faculty Art History
Academy Meandros and Meandros Library Chief Publications Coordinator
Painting is a leading field where the children display their creativity. Working in this field for many years, Dilek Demirci was born in Kayseri, 1957. She obtained her BA from Mimar Sinan University Fine Arts Faculty Painting in 1982 and her PhD in 1987 from the same faculty. Demirci has been a lecturer at Bosphorus University Fine Arts Faculty since 1985. She has opened many individual and joint exhibitions.
DILEK DEMIRCI
Painter, Lecturer at Bosphorus University Fine Arts Faculty
Director of Children’s Painting Workshop
For the sake of cinema, he quit first İstanbul University Cerrahpaşa Medical Faculty and then Bosphorus University Philosophy Department. In 1985-1990, he worked as a scriptwriter and assistant director in long films for cinema. During the recession period of the Turkish movie sector, between 1990 and 1997, he worked in the advertising sector as scriptwriter, customer representative, commercial film producer and he wrote scripts for TV series. In 1994 he founded the Hayalet film production company. In 1997 he focused on corporate communications, establishing the Corporate Aesthetics which produce corporate films and multimedia. He produced corporate advertising and in-service motivation – training films for private companies such as Marsa, Borusan Pipes, Borusan Logistics, Çelebi Holding, Çelebi Air Services, Danone, Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble, Kraft, Brisa, Turkcell, Çelebi, Oyak, Koç Holding, Koçnet, HCTrading and for public institutions such as İstanbul Technical University and İstanbul Council. He gave counselling and training for Apple-Bilkom on Desktop Video Editing and DVD Authoring.
OMHUR KAYNAK
Publicist, Corporate Communications Experts
Festival Meandros General Coordinator
We would like to thank all our artists who have made this dream come true, designing and improving the various activities in Festival Meandros; all our friends who have put their hearts in it and worked hard; and our mentors who have honoured us with
their presence.
