Art Interrupted

Art Interrupted: Remember

In Turkey, journalists Sercan Meriç and Anıl Mert Özsoy chose Kardeş Türküler, a contemporary multilingual Turkish ethnic / folkloric band, as their documentary subject. In their short film Remember (Hatırla), the band’s history, motivation, artistic perspective, and worldview are represented by musicians who have performed in the band at different times. The documentary also focuses on the band’s struggle to fight oppression and to freely express their music in Turkish, Kurdish, Armenian, Greek and many other languages. In a country like Turkey with a tense political atmosphere, it is very difficult to make art. This is why the Kardeş Türküler Project is one of the country’s most important intellectual activities.

This multilingual art project has also struggled with oppression and censorship. Our motive for making this documentary is to explain the unifying nature of art in Turkey, where people from different ethnic backgrounds live together.

Our intent is to reflect the motivation and working discipline of Kardeş Türküler, which examines the cultural journey of both the Kurdish and Turkish peoples, whose ongoing conflicts over many years have nearly prompted a civil war in Turkey, shared the 2 film directors. 

One of the most important aspects of this documentary is showing that the Kardeş Türküler Project is art that resists censorship and oppression. The experiences of the Kardeş Türküler Project can be interpreted as preserving a precious heritage for the future because they play an important role in recording languages ​​and melodies that are about to disappear and sharing these treasures with its audience and art enthusiasts.

Creative Team

Learn more about the creative team behind this project.

Art Interrupted Project

This film is part of ‘Art Interrupted’ documentary series, produced by Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom for East and Southeast Europe, in cooperation with artists from Turkey, Greece, Armenia, and Georgia.

‘Art Interrupted’ aims to explore the difficulties in the field of art, to raise broader awareness of the problems faced by artists, and to develop collective solutions to problems of freedom of expression in East and Southeast Europe.