INTRODUCING FIREZZ

FIREZZ has been launched as an independent publishing and archival platform dedicated to contemporary art. Its name derives from the Kurdish word “frêz,” referring to a resilient, proliferating plant—an image that reflects FIREZZ’s belief that art likewise expands by transcending borders, centers, and established narratives. Artistic production—whether emerging in an image, a text, an exhibition, or a sound piece—not only constructs its own meaning but also generates new relations, encounters, and modes of thought. FIREZZ seeks to trace and render visible this movement of proliferation.

The platform takes contemporary Kurdish art as its point of departure. However, rather than framing this field as a fixed, closed, or singular identity category, FIREZZ understands it as a dynamic sphere of relations shaped across diverse geographies, languages, historical experiences, and aesthetic approaches. While bringing visibility to the work of Kurdish artists, it also aims to open up the broader artistic and intellectual contexts within which these works operate for critical discussion.

Artists, exhibitions, texts, moving image, performance, sound art, fashion, research, and archival practices constitute FIREZZ’s core areas of interest. The platform aspires to build a living archive—one that follows current production, fosters critical debate, and makes the dispersed memory of contemporary Kurdish art more accessible.

Today, knowledge, documentation, and discussions surrounding Kurdish art circulate in fragmented ways across different countries, languages, and institutions. Artists, researchers, and audiences often have only limited access even to knowledge produced within the same field. FIREZZ aims to establish new connections within this fragmented structure, creating a shared ground for thought among artists, writers, curators, researchers, and readers.

FIREZZ does not approach contemporary art solely through the lens of represented identities; it engages with it through aesthetic forms, modes of production, historical ruptures, and intellectual debates. It should therefore be understood not only as a publishing platform, but also as an open space where diverse voices and perspectives can intersect.

The FIREZZ Editorial Collective was formed by Ebru Ojen, Yonca Karakaš, Fatih Tan, Ahmed Kutlu, and Mahsum Çiçek. Bringing together perspectives from literature, visual arts, criticism, research, and curatorial practice, the collective envisions FIREZZ as a shared ground for thinking, dialogue, and production. Rather than being directed by a single center, editorial processes are shaped through mutual dialogue, critical evaluation, and collective practice. FIREZZ’s editorial approach is grounded in this principle of plurality.

WHY FIREZZ?

Despite a remarkable increase in production within contemporary Kurdish art over the past two decades, a sustainable publishing infrastructure that systematically documents, tracks, and critically engages with these practices has yet to fully emerge. While catalogs, exhibition texts, independent research, and dispersed online content exist, the number of independent and continuous platforms that bring these materials together within a shared framework remains limited.

Moreover, knowledge production on Kurdish art is largely shaped by exhibitions, institutions, and periodic projects. An artist’s visibility is often confined to the scope of the exhibition, biennial, or curatorial framework in which they participate. Yet the development of an artistic field depends on the continuity of criticism, research, dialogue, publishing, and archival practices.

This need becomes even more pronounced given the geographically dispersed nature of Kurdish artistic production. There is no consistent or sustainable network of circulation among artists working across Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Europe, and the United States. As a result, even artists producing within the same period may remain unaware of one another’s work. While this condition stems in part from fragmentation imposed by political borders, it also constitutes a broader cultural, intellectual, and archival issue.

Similarly, the history of contemporary Kurdish art has yet to be adequately written. Information on many artists, initiatives, and exhibitions remains scattered across personal archives, outdated catalogs, or sources with limited accessibility. This fragmented memory makes it difficult for new generations to engage with their own histories, while also preventing a comprehensive evaluation of the field.

Discussions on Kurdish art often center on representation and identity, while issues such as aesthetics, form, medium, performance, sound, digital culture, curatorial practices, the art market, and art theory remain insufficiently visible. Yet the maturation and wider recognition of an artistic field depend on its capacity to generate its own internal debates.

FIREZZ emerges precisely in response to these needs.

The platform seeks to document contemporary Kurdish art, make dispersed archives visible, establish new connections among artists, and open up space for critical and theoretical engagement. It also aims to contribute to the formation of an art public sphere that goes beyond the circulation of exhibition announcements. By situating Kurdish art within the global discourse of contemporary art, FIREZZ approaches it as an active contributor to both intellectual and aesthetic production. This constitutes FIREZZ’s most compelling premise: contributing to the infrastructure of an art public sphere that has not yet fully materialized. This is a more concrete and defensible claim than a generalized ambition such as “promoting Kurdish art.”

FIREZZ Editorial Collective

info@firezz.com