Dirimart is pleased to announce Santosha, Çiğdem Aky’s second solo exhibition at the gallery. In this new body of work, Aky steps away from the formal structures that have long shaped her painting practice and leaves behind the frameworks that once limited her. Letting go of control, aesthetic aims, and familiar thought patterns, she allows each painting to unfold in its own rhythm. Guided by a sense of quiet, this new phase opens an inner space of liberation in which colour moves with an autonomous presence and a soft and intuitive visual language emerges. Santosha offers a realm of exploration that shares with the viewer the serenity, clarity, and state of pure presence that accompany this shift in the artist’s practice.
The exhibition takes its title from santosha, a Sanskrit concept that refers to contentment, a mindset where the present moment is enough, and finding ease with what already is. It is one of the Niyamas that refer, in yogic philosophy, to the positive responsibilities to one’s self and describes the ability to cultivate calm and fulfilment regardless of external conditions. Developed in parallel with Aky’s own process of personal transformation, this new period brings together her search for inner balance and acceptance within an abstract visual vocabulary. The exhibition presents a coherent selection that makes this journey visible for the first time.
Aky’s practice centres on an intuitive relationship with colour and its transformation on the surface of the canvas. Through the interplay of depth, structure, and tone, she creates distinct colour spaces using a form that brings together geometric precision and spontaneous brushwork. This method allows the layering, interaction, and shifting influence of colours to become visible. By avoiding preliminary drawing in order to preserve the immediacy of the moment, Aky positions colour as an independent force within a balance of intention and instinct. Dynamic fields of colour emerge through varied paint applications, meeting strong contrasts, gestural marks, and geometric pillars that anchor the composition, prevent figurative readings, and create an abstract language. Rooted in a figurative tradition yet shaped by observations of urban landscapes and changing atmospheres of light, her works unfold into rhythmic compositions and intuitive arrangements of colour. Each painting becomes an active study of colour, form and movement and offers a multilayered visual experience that opens different paths of perception for the viewer.
Aky’s new series marks a departure from the rectangular form that previously shaped her compositions and signals a period in which she allows the paintings to determine their own course. By releasing the structural constraint entirely, she enters a mode of working that seeks inner resolution rather than an aesthetic result. Colour becomes the guiding force while quietening the mind and relinquishing control opens a freer and more instinctive space for the artist. The painting becomes an experience in which emotional and internal currents rise to the surface and are shaped less by structure than by the nature of colour itself.
The works in the exhibition reveal this search as it progresses in parallel with the artist’s own inner transformation. Moving away from earlier concerns, Aky adopts a deeper and quieter approach, free from aesthetic goals and predetermined concepts. Silence becomes the main guide and the flow that begins when the brush touches the canvas reflects a state defined not by control but by surrender. Favouring a soft and delicate visual language without strong contrasts, Aky focuses on subtle states such as calm, openness, clarity, and gratitude rather than on clear boundaries. Inspired by Eastern philosophies that contemplate on those concepts, the series avoids an explanatory narrative and instead invites the viewer to encounter the works within their own inner stillness. Each painting becomes a step in an inward journey that moves from idea to presence and from limitation to expansiveness.
Carrying the traces of this movement from form to formlessness, Santosha brings together a new group of paintings that invite the viewer into a space of quiet, stillness, and pure being. The exhibition, which gathers Aky’s recent works shaped by intuition and surrender, will be on view at Dirimart Pera from 8 January to 22 February 2025.
Location: Dirimart Pera
