Ras(t)gele, serigrafi baskı tekniğiyle (20 Edisyon) üretilmiş 8 adet, 50×70 cm, tek renk desenden oluşan yerleştirme. Tampere. Baski: Big Baboli Istanbul (2021).

Rastgele is an eight-part serigraphy installation in which fictional fish characters are constructed from fragments of real fish species found along the Bosphorus migration route. The work emerged from my research on the Marmara Sea ecosystem and from watching Underwater Life in Istanbul (2014), a documentary by Alptekin Baloğlu that documented the rich marine biodiversity of the region in the early 2000s. As a licensed diver, encountering this material prompted me to reflect on how dramatically this ecosystem has changed and to imagine what kinds of living beings might still be visible in these waters today.

The Bosphorus is both a biodiversity corridor and a geopolitical passage that has historically connected continents, cultures, and histories. By recombining fragments of real fish into hybrid creatures that do not exist in nature, the installation reflects on multiplicity, migration, and coexistence. Istanbul itself has long functioned as a complex cultural ecosystem shaped by movement and exchange.
Against the backdrop of contemporary political climates increasingly marked by polarization and rigid identity boundaries, the work proposes hybridity as an alternative way of imagining collective life. Through these speculative marine characters, the installation invites viewers to reconsider diversity as a generative condition rather than a threat.

The title Rastgele derives from a word historically used in fishing culture meaning both “random” and “good luck.” In this context, it becomes an invitation to reflect on our relationship with ecological and cultural diversity, and on the responsibility to remain open to multiple perspectives. For me, artistic practice carries a responsibility to reveal the beauty and potential embedded in plurality.