Artists Anonymous (AA) began, like many great ideas, as a joke. It was created to provide a "safe space" for creatives to come together and share their challenges, obsessions, worries, neuroses, and other seemingly dysfunctional yet transformative emotional and intellectual drives. Although the name can be misleading—I've even been contacted by individuals struggling with alcoholism seeking advice, which led to interesting conversations—AA is fundamentally a multi-disciplinary platform. It invites people from various fields to collaborate, brainstorm, and develop practical solutions in an inclusive manner.

 

A playful abbreviation for “Artists” Anonymous, is an experimental workshop developed combining performative elements, team building exercises, and resembles a group therapy session (it is not), in order to bring individuals from wide variety of disciplines  to create a sense of community and  an organic platform for networking. The workshop aims to facilitate an open environment to explore the idea of art or artistic approaches as a coping mechanism towards obstacles individuals face in their daily lives. Let that be social, personal, environmental, political, geographical, communicational or ideological. The nature of each session is unique, as the topics as well as the performative elements of the workshop changes each time. Regardless the name, AA meetings are not meant for only artists, rather the workshop intend to bring people from different fields who respond to their surroundings in a creative manner. Imagine a circle of a programmer, a sociologist, an engineer,  a photographer, a nurse and a film maker together, although this may sound like the beginning of an interesting joke, the potential of this circle is limitless. Essentially the gatherings are to create a sense of connectedness, in a world of solitude which has become the new human condition. AA emphasizes sincere, open, and honest communication, and it strongly supports the use of art as a means to cope with life's challenges. The first session took place at NiMAC as part of the "Bizim Kütüphane - Nevertheless, we end up here" exhibition/happening.

​

Below please find the one and only photograph of the very first event. This session was actually video recorded but the videographer never delivered the footage. Go figure.

​