Aug 12

Burak Bulut Yildirim

Burak Bulut Yildirim is a photographer who has exhibited in Berlin, Istanbul, Rome, Barcelona, and Thessaloniki, Greece. His most recent solo exhibition focuses on a series known as Dress Code: Light and was featured at Die Akt Galerie in Berlin. He has also had dual features at Volksbank Gallery in Heilbronn, Germany. Burak founded a photography school which has taught more than 5,000 students to date and he has active studios in both Berlin and Istanbul.

The photography focuses on nude figures ranging from close up shots to theatrical wide angles with women interacting with interior environments. The soft yet dramatic lighting and filters used in the photography makes some of the images appear like a painting, such as Hotel Room (top of article). Burak captures specific delicate environments which enhance the characters of his figures such as using rooms with large windows or spacious areas with high ceilings, creating a sense of negative space.

Ranging from sensual to erotic, the women are portrayed comfortably in their natural form within the photography. Various interactions with environments in the works seem to convey a concept, such as a woman laying down in a bathtub full of red wine. The photograph communicates unusual sensuality combining the historic juice of revelry, debauchery, and refinement with a nude female. Burak’s most recent works convey portions of female body parts with extreme high contrast and in fusion with texture, however his works showing full female figures in interiors convey a sense of psychological and theatrical strategy towards understanding the relationship between figures and space.

Pixie (pictured above) portrays a woman in a nightgown looking over her shoulder in a peculiar fashion as if someone has just entered the room. Someone unexpected based on her facial features and subtle sense of surprise. She sits idly by a window sill trying to enjoy a cigarette only to appear to be disturbed in her moment of solitude. The scene conveys a sense of interruption from silence and contemplation based on subtle body language and an environment of comfort. Almost the entire composition remains covered in shadows as the dark room conveys a sense wanting to be removed from others.

Burak Bulut Yildirim can be described as a photographer who offers refreshing takes on figurative portraiture and relationships with interior space. His portfolio envisions various takes on feminine beauty and the purpose of portraying nudes in contemporary art. Burak instills a sense of drama and theatrics, not in narrative storytelling, but rather through the use of subtle shadow, soft light, negative space, conceptual environments, and body language. Through sensual portrayals and neo-noir aesthetics, Burak Bulut Yildirim leaves an impression upon the viewer of a photographer driven by mature and advanced takes on creating representational scenery reflecting deep psychological impulses.