Through a large-scale video and immersive soundscape, Yenirce stages a portrait that challenges conventional representation. A young woman is shown, holding a reflective object. By moving it, she controls her own visibility—alternately shielding herself from the gaze of the viewer and becoming enveloped by a blinding golden light.
While SPLITTER ostensibly offers a portrait, it radically subverts the genre. The subject is not passive but actively determines her relationship to the camera, negotiating between exposure and protection. Yenirce’s approach emphasises autonomy, granting the protagonist agency over her own visibility. The work becomes a site of power dynamics, where the boundaries between revelation and concealment, presence and disappearance are constantly in motion.
This interplay resonates deeply with Leyla Yenirce’s exploration of Kurdish identity, informed by her personal history and the ongoing conflict in Kurdistan. Born in Kurdistan and raised in Germany, Yenirce’s work often addresses themes of survival, resistance, and the politics of visibility. SPLITTER reflects on the legacy of female Kurdish fighters, whose battles for freedom and existence continue against the backdrop of technological warfare. Drones and surveillance technologies have transformed the terrain of resistance, making once protective mountains visible and vulnerable. Yet Yenirce’s work also gestures towards new forms of defiance: the blinding light that shields the woman from view becomes a metaphor for the ongoing struggle for autonomy in the face of asymmetrical power.
By situating SPLITTER within the former monastery church, Yenirce invites viewers to contemplate the architectural echoes of hierarchy and exclusion. Once a place of spiritual authority, the church’s space is now reoriented to emphasize the real world and the marginalized. Yenirce displaces the spiritual order embodied by the building’s architecture, turning instead towards the lived experiences of those fighting for recognition and survival.
Leyla Yenirce, born in 1992 in Qubînê, lives and works in Berlin. The artist and musician works with painting, sculpture, video and performance to create multi-layered works that negotiate themes such as feminism, war, pop culture, genocide, desire, longing and irony. Yenirce studied fine arts with Jutta Koether at the University of Fine Arts Hamburg until 2022. She has been awarded numerous prizes and scholarships, including the prestigious Ars Viva Prize in 2023. The Kunsthaus Hamburg dedicated her first solo exhibition to her in 2022. Her works have also been shown in numerous renowned institutions such as the Museum Folkwang, Essen (2024), the Haus der Kunst, Munich (2023), the gfzk, Leipzig (2023) and the Bundeskunsthalle, Bonn (2021).
‘Leyla Yenirce. Splitter’ marks the start of a programmatic series at the Kunstmuseum Magdeburg, which presents music and sound installations in the former monastery church.
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