BIO
Onur Gökmen currently resides in Berlin. His work spans sculpture, photography, video, installation, and painting, addressing reality as something perpetually informed by the entwinement of past and future. He draws on collective histories, past events, and myths to map an archaeology of the self, uncovering the foundations that inform our sense of historical hierarchy. His work has been presented at various institutions and events, including the Sharjah Biennial; Salt (Istanbul); Museum für Moderne Kunst (Frankfurt); Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (Madrid); KuLe (Berlin); James Fuentes (New York); Asia Culture Center (Gwangju); and Delfina Foundation (London).
PROJECT
Subsoil revisits a largely overlooked episode in the environmental and institutional history of Türkiye: the detection of radioactive contamination in Black Sea tea following the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. Drawing on research at Middle East Technical University, the project investigates how scientific findings are shaped, silenced, or dismissed within state institutions. Drawing on archival materials and narrative reconstruction, it traces the movement of radiation through natural and institutional systems, highlighting how environmental harm—though invisible and slow—can alter public health, policy, and collective memory.