Müge Yıldız is an artist-filmmaker using analogue and digital media in moving image and installations to explore everyday life based on philosophy, psychogeography and archaeology.
Müge Yıldız (born 1985, Turkey) studied cinema and philosophy respectively at Galatasaray University in Istanbul, Turkey, and received cinema courses as an Erasmus exchange student at Paris 3 Sorbonne In Paris, France. She produces experimental videos and films, employing a shooting method she calls “being a ghost” producing moving image and installation based on everyday life observations informed by existential themes. She works largely with analogue films such as 8mm, super 8, and archive sound and footage.
She participated in film festivals and exhibitions nationally and internationally such as ‘Resource Utopia’ Elgiz Museum Istanbul, Turkey, ‘Young Fresh Different VIII Zilberman Gallery Istanbul, Turkey, Autofocus 9, Torino, Italy, ‘Experiments in Cinema’ Albuquerque, USA, ‘Rencontres Traverse Video’ Toulouse, France, ‘Antimatter Media Art’ BC, Canada, Anthology Film Archives’ New York, USA. International Film Festival Oberhausen Seminar with LUX UK & Flaherty Seminar USA. She recently took part in the Istanbul Biennial Production and Research Programme and her last artist film project was granted the ‘SAHA Sustainability Fund’ by SAHA Association.
Anxiety
Super 8mm, transferred 2K / 03:17 min / 2016
00:46 min excerpt
Looking for my own existence in the streets, in the city that I live, I could only find anxiety. This is part of my daily life; the film confronts the mundane images that I encounter every day. In this internal existential search, I chose a companion, the poems of Henri Michaux Waiting, Small, Cursed, A Lost Man. I read and recorded the poems, and laid them over the sound as a narration.
Swimmer
HD Video / 04:09 / 2017
00:30 min excerpt
‘Swimmer’ was shot during an art residency programme in Russe, Bulgaria. inspired by Frank Perry and Sydney Pollack’s 1968 film American film The Swimmer (1968) which is an adaptation from John Cheever’s short story. In this video, I brought the nomad swimmer into existence. The swimmer swims through various pools, a river, puddles, and water containers for street animals. As she swims, the voice of Canadian experimental filmmaker Barbara Sternberg talks about life, cinema, and philosophy, as well as myself, reading a passage from Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha.
A Trip to the moon
16mm, Archival footage / 10:17 / 2016
00:59 min excerpt
After a hundred years of George Melies’ A Trip to the Moon, I revisited the idea of space travel. I edited 16mm NASA Apollo Missions footage with archival footage to express my feelings about the human aspect of space travel and life in general.
Lilly blues
HD Video / 01:38 min / 2017
This is a video of a white balloon that I found on the street and tried to catch. The chase of the balloon was a moment symbolic of my life with Prozac in search of happiness. I try to hold on to this moment. I read out the Prozac instruction/specification sheet in the voice-over which sets the narrative of the video. The name Lilly comes from the company that issued the medicine and is also connected to my name which translated to Latin means, lily of the valley. This way, the video becomes a culmination of personal facts and experiences.