S. Buse Yıldırım

A collection of 8mm film reels from İlhan Mimaroğlu’s archive—once tucked away in whisky boxes—has found new life through art. Curated by director Serdar Kökçeoğlu and producer Dilek Aydın, the project brings together visual artists and musicians to reimagine these long-lost images. Over thirty artists transformed the footage into fifteen distinct audiovisual pieces, blending experimental soundscapes with contemporary video art. The project concludes with a special highlight: the first-ever screening of Mimaroğlu’s silent short film about a street jazz festival, accompanied by Erdem Helvacıoğlu’s dark jazz score.

At the beginning of the 1960s, İlhan and Güngör Mimaroğlu moved from İstanbul to New York to start a new life. With a keen interest in avant-garde music, İlhan Mimaroğlu went on to become a leading composer of the nascent field of electronic music with his work at Columbia University, while Güngör Mimaroğlu would show an exemplary political stance at the forefront of the peace protests that took the 1960s by storm. "Mimaroğlu" is the story of a unique pair of spirits that have complemented each other in many ways.