It was not easy Print

Kars-Turkey 1956Yucel Donmez has been continuing his artistic work in Chicago since 1980. He has staged many exhibitions both in Turkey and in the States and was accepted into one of the most influential art encyclopaedias to shape American art history, Who is Who in American Art in 2000. His inclusion in the Biographical Encyclopaedia of American Painters, Sculptors and Engravers of the U.S. in 2002, followed by the Devonports Art Reference encyclopaedia, Dnmez has secured a permanent place in American art history. Yucel Donmez also appears among the 63 artists from Chicago to have entered the renowned art reference book, Art Diary International, published every year by the famous Flash Art magazine in Italy. On Ycel Dnmez paintings Prof. Ismail Tunal(Art Historian)Ycel Dnmez is an artist who has spent many years working in the United States, opening exhibitions in the most select establishments, has become a reputed artist and entered art encyclopaedias. Despite this, he is still considered a foreigner in the United States, because his art is not a product of American culture. Returning to Turkey for this reason, Dnmez aims firstly to begin a new artistic career in his native land and then to take his place in the international art world with his original national identity. This is because the mix of contemporaneity and national-originality is accepted as an important criterion within the value judgements of this arena. We are of the belief that there should be some weight in looking at Ycel Dnmez works of art from this perspective. Ycel Dnmez art lays out in front of our eyes, an unusual, surreal and dramatic world. When we draw a little closer to the paintings, it is possible to see elements belonging to traditional Turkish art forms such as Ottoman calligraphy, Tura (Sultans signatures in Ottoman calligraphy) decorative art, ornamentation and above all ebru (traditional Turkish marbling), weaving together a multicoloured dream-like blanket. But on lifting this blanket, we become aware that we have reached a space of limitless thought and emotion. This designed unreal space is one of forms and experiences brought together by a contemporary abstract interpretation of existence that can stand up against traditional values. Dnmez paintings are part of this understanding of space.