Mardin Bienali

Born in 1971 in Istanbul, Turkey, Ali Kazma is a lens-based media artist living and working in Istanbul and Paris.

He has a master of arts degree from the New School in New York City.

Questioning social organization and the value of human activity, he highlights the relationship between the visible and the invisible aspects of reality by looking closely at the management of labour, time, bodies, gestures, space and processes. Kazma’s attentive eye collects specific activities in a broad range of economic, industrial, scientific, medical, social and artistic spheres.

He has an interest in spaces of social significance, places of production, in industries and handicraft, as well as in the details of machinery and ritualistic, repetitive daily tasks.

The artist, who represented Turkey at the 55th Venice Biennale – Pavilion of Turkey in 2013, had a comprehensive solo exhibition at Istanbul Modern, Istanbul in 2025. Ali Kazma’s other solo exhibitions include Nouveau Musée National de Monaco (2023), Albergo Diurno Venezia (Milan, 2018), MUNTREF (Buenos Aires, 2018), Jeu de Paume Paris (Paris, 2017), Arter (Istanbul, 2015), CAPRI (Düsseldorf, 2015), Hirshhorn Museum (Washington, 2010) and Platform Garanti (Istanbul, 2004).

Group exhibitions and biennials include Fondation Cartier, Paris and Foto Arsenal Wien (2025); MEP Paris, (2024), Fondation Thaile, France
(2024), Lenbachhaus, Munich (2024), MAST, Italy (2024), Video Sound Art Festival, Milan (2023), BienalSur, Buenos Aires (2023), 6th Kuandu Biennale, Taipei (2018), 7th Moscow International Biennale of Contemporary Art (2017), MAXXI, Rome (2016), Musée d’Art Contemporaine de Lyon (2013), 30th Sao Paulo Biennial (2012), Istanbul Biennial (2001, 2007, 2011) Muzeum Sztuki Lodz (2012), Istanbul Modern (2011), Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf (2010) and New Museum, New York (2010). He has received the UNESC Prize for Promotion of the Arts in 2001 and the Nam June Paik Award in 2010.

 His work work is in institutional collections such as MoMA (New York), CNAP (Paris), Fondation Cartier (Paris), NMNM (Monaco, France), Istanbul Modern (Istanbul), MEP (Paris), MONA (Tasmania), Sztuki Museum (Lodz), Tate Modern (London), TBA21 (Vienna), Collection Foundation Louis Vuitton (Paris) and VKV Foundation Collection (Istanbul).