These past few months have offered new experiences for all of us, and an opportunity to approach the old normal with fresh perspective. Creatives especially seem to have found alternative routes among the chaos, opening the doors for all of us to rethink traditional formats. Ege Akdemir and Selen Gürsoy are two such individuals with an ability for adaptation, whose origin story is based on an understanding that their friendship would extend into something much greater. It is this chemistry that led them to co-founding fam° which features their talent agency famajans° – offering ethical representation to young Turkish talent in illustration and animation, providing a dedicated home for artist portfolios, and assisting artists in navigating the intricacies of the industry while finding clients and collaborative projects – as well as famstore°, which hosts their illustration gallery and permits a bit of flexibility in pursuing artistic projects. It is here you can find the impressive group exhibition Ozmoz, featuring the illustrations of 23 artists highlighted in the latest collection from fam°. The catch? The exhibition is an immersive audiovisual experience, playing much like a game, where visitors must explore each illustration individually in 3D and find their way on to the next room/illustration, navigating as a maze and offering guests the opportunity to reflect with each piece in a unique and meaningful way. It is a modern twist on the exhibition experience, and one that is genuinely memorable, allowing for works to stick with the viewer long after concluding the exhibition. As it employs rich audio and visuals into game design, it is an experience best suited for headphones and full screen. In wandering the many halls of this labyrinth, it is evident a great deal of love and dedication went into each of its passages, and we very much look forward to future projects from these two creatives.
We took some time to speak with Ege and Selen on their crossing paths, the motivations behind creating fam°, some of the many complexities in launching a project as ambitious as Ozmoz, as well as their reflections on the process and reception behind the exhibition.
Could you tell us a little bit about yourselves and your backgrounds?
Ege: Of course, I’m Ege, I am working as a Research Assistant at the Sociology Department of Boğaziçi University and managing fam° at the same time if I am not also doing something else.
Selen: I’m Selen. Originally I am an architect. After we founded fam°, I’ve been working two jobs and loving it!
How did the two of you meet and what inspired you to collaborate on creating fam°? What are your respective roles?
Ege: We actually met through a friend and were not that close before we moved in together. I was living with our mutual friend and had to move out, we found a bigger house and called Selen to move in with us. Luckily she said yes and our journey began.
Selen: When we started living together we soon understood that we had to do something together. We had an immediate click. Then we discovered that we were both thinking about contributing to the community of local illustrators for several years and decided to found fam°.
Ege: We usually do everything together, especially when we were living together. We are both very opinionated so it can get messy when we disagree but we always find a meeting point, but usually, Selen has the final word in visual designs and I have the final say in communication.
Could you tell us a bit about the scope of fam° and what is your ambition with the project?
Selen: The idea started with us deciding to found an illustration gallery that can expand the local illustration scene. We wanted to create a platform where young talents who do not have the necessary network to get recognized feel that they are seen and appreciated. We wanted their art to be reachable and affordable. We still share these values but our scope has expanded.
Ege: After one year, we have grown into an agency that not only has an online gallery but also represents and supports artists by taking on creatively challenging projects. In the long run, we want to establish better working conditions for illustrators and animation artists where copyrights, usage rights, equal and fair payment can be discussed professionally. We want everybody to understand the right value of the works that these artists create so that more qualified and aesthetically challenging projects can multiply and artists can actually maintain their lives by doing what they love.
You recently launched Ozmoz – an exhibition game that is certainly something new and different. On the site, you reflect a bit on the motivation behind it, but could you tell us a bit more about how it came about? Did the current pandemic climate play a part in this alternative exhibition format, or was this something you had been working on prior?
Selen: Our last exhibition before Ozmoz was in a gallery space in January 2020. After that exhibition, we were certain that we had to do something more dynamic, reachable, interactive, and fun. We were thinking about an online exhibition since day one but the idea started to be shaped in January.
Ege: With Corona everyone started doing online exhibitions, which was both good and bad for us. These new digital experiments created an art scene where a new consumption form of art is being tested out, people are getting used to experiencing art digitally, this is good, but it also made our idea a bit expected. Still, we think that bringing gaming and art scenes together is a fresh aesthetic experience and we are still working on improving the idea.
Selen: Gaming sector was always an interest for us. We know that the art part of games is becoming the key factor that distinguishes a production from others. Visually pleasing scenes in a game always have a captivating atmosphere. Some of our artists were starting to lean in that direction more and we also started to have more connections from the sector, so we said why not bring these two worlds together.
Technically and logistically, it certainly seems to be quite an ambitious undertaking. Could you tell us a bit about this process? Were there any notable challenges? How many people were involved other than the artists?
Selen: We are a small team. It is usually just the two of us who do everything within our reach. We collab with other young talents only in fields that we do not have time to learn. In this project, our key collaborator was Batu Yıldız, who is a brilliant mind in developing games. Ege’s friend Turgut Mavuk who actually has a minor in game sound design from Berklee made the sound and music design of the game, and Simay Yaman, a talented artist who we recently started representing did the branding and the website design. It was a hectic period, to be honest, it still is.
Ege: Selen did all the 3D models by herself, she is super quick and creative because of her architecture background, and we did the curation together, I managed the tasks and texts of the artists but we were always in collaboration.
How did you choose the artists who would be participating, or more broadly, that you work with as fam°?
Ege: We already had a group of artists who we started our journey together with, but we gained new members this year after our open call. All artists who had the time to produce new work for the exhibition were featured in Ozmoz.
Selen: For me, it was the most fun and mentally challenging period of the foundation process, to search for and meet the artists we represent now. We considered their styles, tried not to overlap the artistic visions, met them personally, and became very close. This led us to map fam°s colors and capabilities. It fits like a puzzle!
I realize it’s hard to choose a favorite among so many contributions, but do any of them particularly resonate with you on a personal level?
Selen: Spending days on 3D modellings of each artwork, it’s impossible for me to separate one from another. One thing though, when I felt frustrated and needed time to think about the game, I went into Sumeyra’s virtual room “I am not at Home” and just stared at the screen watching the candle burn.
Ege: I don’t have a favorite, similar but different to Selen I took comfort in the sounds that Turgut made for the rooms whenever I felt overwhelmed. Some of them are really like meditation tunes.
What has the reception been like on the user-end? Have you found that individuals are able to immerse themselves seamlessly into the work or is there a bit of a learning curve on the technical side?
Ege: When we were doing the game development, we had to test with everyone we know. We wanted the experience to be as inclusive as it can be. For me the most valuable helpers were my parents who have zero gaming experience. We enhanced the interface until they were able to get around freely within the game. But still, we get comments from non-gamers about how to improve the UX. Interestingly we also get comments from gamers about how to improve the experience in a way that is more game-like. Younger generations, for example, get bored after sometime when they realize that there is not much to do in the exhibition. Comments from both ends challenge us to decide what kind of experience we want Ozmoz to be and what direction we want to move forward.
Being able to reflect on it now, what are your feelings on how it ultimately turned out? Is it something you would do again with future formats?
Selen: I’m just going to go ahead and say it, it’s an awesome experience! I’ve already started thinking about new ways to explore the concept of an art show. The future holds great news coming from fam° universe.
Ege: It is also amazing how people reacted! We got so many positive comments! I personally love the one comment on our ios app that says something like “You drew my dreams, I felt like I just woke up after it was over.” For me this insight is priceless.
Has ATÖLYE fit into this process?
Ege: Yes immensely, we did a feedback session with a group of volunteers, and they had incredibly helpful comments. They all brought a different perspective to the table and their feedback enabled us to level up our game.
Selen: We also thank them on our website but let’s thank them here again!
To keep up with Ege and Selen and their work, be sure to visit the official pages for fam° – famajans° and famstore°. The official ‘Ozmoz’ exhibition can be visited here. Be sure and follow them on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
ATÖLYE Spotlight is our series on the inspiring community members of Istanbul’s most creative space.
All images courtesy of the interviewee.
