Pinar Yoldas (Pınar Yoldaş, Turkish pronunciation: pɯnar joɫˈdɑʃ) is a Turkish-American architect, artist and professor at

University of California San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego is t ...

."Pinar Yoldas"
''The Visual Arts Department at UC San Diego'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. She is known for art and architecture that focus on the

anthropocene The Anthropocene ( ) is a proposed geological epoch dating from the commencement of significant human impact on Earth's geology and ecosystems, including, but not limited to, anthropogenic climate change. , neither the International Commissi ...

futurism Futurism ( it, Futurismo, link=no) was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy, and to a lesser extent in other countries, in the early 20th century. It emphasized dynamism, speed, technology, youth, violence, and objects such ...

, and

feminist technoscience Feminist technoscience is a transdisciplinary branch of science studies which emerged from decades of feminist critique on the way gender and other identity markers are entangled in the combined fields of science and technology. The term technoscie ...

. Yoldas highlights the term "speculative biology" in comparison to experimental architecture of the 1990s, as design of tissues, organs, organisms, biological systems,

ecotype In evolutionary ecology, an ecotype,Greek: ''οίκος'' = home and ''τύπος'' = type, coined by Göte Turesson in 1922 sometimes called ecospecies, describes a genetically distinct geographic variety, population, or race within a species, ...

s and ecosystems in order to catalyze creative critical thinking. Her process merges hand drawing and sculpting with

bio-engineering Biological engineering or bioengineering is the application of principles of biology and the tools of engineering to create usable, tangible, economically-viable products. Biological engineering employs knowledge and expertise from a number o ...

and digital technologies. She is a Guggenheim fellow and a

MacDowell Colony MacDowell is an artist's residency program in Peterborough, New Hampshire, United States, founded in 1907 by composer Edward MacDowell and his wife, pianist and philanthropist Marian MacDowell. Prior to July 2020, it was known as the MacDowell ...

fellow.

Early life

Yoldas was born in

Denizli Denizli is an industrial city in the southwestern part of Turkey and the eastern end of the alluvial valley formed by the river Büyük Menderes, where the plain reaches an elevation of about . Denizli is located in the country's Aegean Region. ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

to an architect father and physicist mother. She had a solo painting exhibition at the age of five in Denizli Public Library, giving her the title youngest painter to have an exhibition in Turkey alongside renowned painter Bedri Baykam who had his first exhibition at the age of six. Yoldas attended Izmir Science College where she was awarded a bronze medal in the National Science Olympics organized by the

Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey The Scientific and Technological Research Institution of Turkey ( tr, Türkiye Bilimsel ve Teknolojik Araştırma Kurumu, TÜBİTAK) is a national agency of Turkey whose stated goal is to develop "science, technology and innovation" (STI) policies ...

."Pinar Yoldas"
''Node Forum'', Retrieved 3 December 2017. She received a degree in Architecture at Middle East Technical University (2002). She moved to Istanbul in 2002 to receive an MA in Visual Communication Design at

Istanbul Bilgi University Istanbul Bilgi University ( tr, İstanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi), officially established in 1996, is a private university located in Istanbul, Turkey. The university has 4 campuses centrally-located in Istanbul namely SantralIstanbul, Kuştepe, Do ...

(2004) and an MS in Internet Technologies at

Istanbul Technical University Istanbul Technical University ( tr, İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi, commonly referred to as ITU or The Technical University) is an international technical university located in Istanbul, Turkey. It is the world's third-oldest technical university ...

(2006)."Pinar Yoldas: An Ecosystem of Excess"
''The Visual Arts Department at UC San Diego'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. In this period she worked as a children's book illustrator, painting tutor, programmer and graphic designer to support her education. In 2006 she moved to Los Angeles to work with

Casey Reas Casey Edwin Barker Reas (born 1972), also known as C. E. B. Reas or Casey Reas, is an American artist whose conceptual, procedural and minimal artworks explore ideas through the contemporary lens of software. Reas is perhaps best known for having ...

. In 2008 she graduated from

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

Design Media Aarts with an MFA in

New Media Art New media art includes artworks designed and produced by means of new media, electronic media technology, technologies, comprising virtual art, computer graphics, computer animation, digital art, interactive art, sound art, Internet art, video g ...

.
''UCLA Design Media Arts'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. In 2016, she earned her Ph.D in Media Arts and Sciences from

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

with her thesis titled ''Speculative Biologies: New Directions in Art in the Age of the Anthropocene''."Speculative Biologies: New Directions in Art in the Age of the Anthropocene, Pinar Yoldas"
''Duke University Libraries'', Retrieved 26 November 2017.

Artistic career

Yoldas started designing organisms at UCLA. Her first designs included fictitious sexual organs and organisms that could be plugged into male or female bodies. Her practice is informed by her heterogeneous background in arts, design and sciences, and involves mediating her research as a sensory experience for non-scientists."Pinar Yoldas (video interview)"
''FEAT (Future Emerging Art and Technology)'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. Art and neuroscience Yoldas' work emphasizes the role of neuroscience in understanding artistic experience. She received a certificate in Cognitive Neuroscience at Duke University where she built the art installation "Limbique.""Pinar Yoldas: An Artistic Exploration of Neuroscience"
''mbSci'', Retrieved 11 February 2018. Environmentalism According to

Bruce Sterling Michael Bruce Sterling (born April 14, 1954) is an American science fiction author known for his novels and short fiction and editorship of the ''Mirrorshades'' anthology. In particular, he is linked to the cyberpunk subgenre. Sterling's first ...

, "the inquiry on the relationships between man and environment is central to the work of Pinar Yoldas." Her work ''The Very Loud Chamber Orchestra of Endangered Species'' calls attention to the concept of endangered species and the

loss of biodiversity Biodiversity loss includes the worldwide extinction of different species, as well as the local reduction or loss of species in a certain habitat, resulting in a loss of biological diversity. The latter phenomenon can be temporary or permanent, de ...

in relation to climate change. ''Global Warming Hot Yoga Studio'' offers a new type of yoga practice where practitioners are subject to heat coming from a large scale sign that reads "GLOBAL WARMING." ''An Ecosystem of Excess'', ''Fool’s Fowl'' and ''Saltwater Heart'' are works that center around the ideas of disruption of natural systems by anthropogenic forces.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions *''AlterEvolution'' at Ekavart Gallery in Istanbul (2013)"Pinar Yoldas: AlterEvolution"
''Ekavart'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. *''An Ecosystem of Excess'' at Ernst Schering Project Space in Berlin (2014)"An Ecosystem of Excess"
''Ernst Schering Foundation'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. *''The Warm, The Cool and The Cat'' at

Röda Sten Konsthall Röda Sten Konsthall is a contemporary art center located in the district of Majorna under Älvsborg Bridge in Gothenburg, Sweden. ''Konsthall'' roughly translates to "Art Gallery" however the organization is much more similar to a German ''Kunsth ...

in Göteborg (2016)"Röda Sten Konsthall, Pinar Yoldas: The Warm, The Cool and The Cat"
''Röda Sten Konsthall'', Retrieved 26 November 2017 Group exhibitions *''Transmediale'' (2014)"Transmediale: Pinar Yoldas"
''Transmediale'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. *''ExoEvolution'' at ZKM (2015)"ExoEvolution at ZKM, 2015"
''ZKM '', Retrieved 26 November 2017. *''Regeneration Movement: Rethinking Technology in the Digital Age'' at

National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts The National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts (NTMoFA; ) is a museum in West District, Taichung, Taiwan. NTMoFA was established in 1988 and is the first and the only national-grade fine arts museum in Taiwan. The major collections are works by Taiwan ...

(2016)"Regeneration Movement: Rethinking Technology in the Digital Age"
''NTMOFA'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. *''12x12'' at

Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art The Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (SECCA) is a multimedia contemporary art gallery in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. SECCA has no permanent collection but offers exhibitions of works by artists with regional, national, and international ...

in Winston-Salem, North Carolina (2017)"12x12: Pinar Yoldas"
''SECCA'', Retrieved 26 November 2017

Awards

In 2015, Yoldas received the

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in Fine Arts, with her project ''Distilling the Sky'', which involves building an architectural structure to filter polluted air, turn it into ink and a series of performances centered around the ink-making process."Pinar Yoldas"
''John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation'', Retrieved 26 November 2017. Her other awards include Future Emerging Art and Technology Award"Pinar Yoldas and DIACAT"
''FEAT'', Retrieved 11 February 2018. and Ann Arbor Experimental Film Festival Gill Omen Art & Science Award.
''Ann Arbor Film Festival'', Retrieved 11 February 2018.

Selected works

* An Ecosystem of Excess * Kitty AI: Artificial Intelligence for Governance

Publications

* ''Speculative'' eds. Christopher O'Leary and Zach Blas, exhibition catalogue, 2011. * ''Art in the Anthropocene: Encounters Among Aesthetics, Politics, Environments and Epistemologies,'' eds. Heather Davis and Etienne Turpin, Open Humanities Press, 2014. * ''An Ecosystem of Excess,'' Argobooks, 2014.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yoldas, Pınar American artists Year of birth missing (living people) Living people UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture alumni American people of Turkish descent