Neriman Oyman.

01 / LIFE AND TRAINING

A life shaped through painting.

Neriman Oyman was born in Istanbul on 10 October 1965. Her relationship with painting began in childhood, as she sought ways to express her imagination through different materials. She entered working life at an early age and continued drawing while employed in a clothing workshop. Portraiture became an early focus for her observation and interest in the human figure.

She found Avni Memedoğlu’s studio through a newspaper advertisement and studied there from 1990 to 1992, concentrating on drawing and painting technique. While developing her understanding of the figure, she also sought her own imaginative language. In 1992 she established her own studio and began an independent practice.

02 / HER PAINTING

Dreams, nature and people.

Women, birds, trees, animals and cities meet within a shared imaginary world in Oyman’s paintings. The boundaries between people and nature remain fluid, while figures form new relationships between tale and memory. Strong colour contrasts, intricate surfaces and surreal encounters are characteristic of her visual language.

Stories heard in childhood, dreams and living creatures are among the sources of her paintings. She treats colour as an expressive field connected with rhythm and feeling. Her description of herself as a woman who hears colours and sees sounds offers a way into this approach.

This imaginative language remains connected to lived experience. Women’s place in society, poverty, migration and humanity’s relationship with nature are among the subjects that concern her. Personal experience and shared memory coexist in her paintings, whose figures carry both vulnerability and resilience.

03 / EXHIBITIONS AND PUBLICATIONS

From canvas to exhibition, painting to book.

She held her first solo exhibition at the Bakırköy Chamber of Architects in 1992. Later exhibitions brought her work to audiences in Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Eskişehir, Nicosia and Moscow. Group exhibitions and art fairs accompanied her solo projects. The exhibition archive on this site preserves the chronology recovered from her former personal website.

Her 2008 artist book, published by Bilim Sanat Gallery, includes texts by Arslan Mengüç and Zeynep Aliye and brings together her paintings and artistic journey. Exhibitions at Saçaklı Ev Art Gallery in Nicosia in 2009, Turgut Özakman Art Centre in Eskişehir in 2010, and in Izmit form further chapters in that history.

In 2013, “Istanbul, City of Tales” was presented in Moscow. Her archive also records “A Little Hope, Despite It All” at Memorial Şişli Art Gallery that year. In 2024, the fortieth year of her artistic life was marked by “Never-Ending Tales of Once There Was Not” at the historic Hüsrev Kethüda Hamam, curated by Zeynep Öztürk.