Jean Howard, Ayşe Gül Altınay, Milena Grass, and Andrea Crow participated in the opening panel of Women Mobilizing Memory, a working group that explores women's acts of witness and the gendered forms and consequences of political repression and persecution.

Women Mobilizing Memory is one of four working groups that, together, make up the "Women Creating Change" initiative of CSSD. The first-day conversation of the working group revolved around a range of themes, including: the academic/practitioner divide; the political efficacy of academic, artistic, and activist productions; the relationship between memory, history, and archives; the ethical repercussions of witnessing; as well as the intricate link between the personal and the political.

The working group visited the Depo Gallery to attend Ayşe Gül Altınay's and Işın Önol's “Mobilizing Memory: Women Witnessing” exhibit. After the curators were introduced, Banu Karaca discussed the politics of memory as reflected in Turkey's contemporary art and Işın Önol related the exhibit to the country's recent history. Artists who took part in the exhibit included: Silvina Der-Meguerditchian, Susan Meiselas, Nar Photos (Serra Akcan, Fatma Çelik, Gülşin Ketenci, Aylin Kızıl, Serpil Polat), Truth Justice Memory Center (represented by Özlem Kaya), Aylin Tekiner, Emine Gözde Sevim, Lorie Novak, and Gülçin Aksoy.

Day 1 Report contributed by: Bürge Abiral and Dilara Çalışkan

Bürge Abiral is a Masters student in Cultural Studies at Sabancı University. Dilara Çalışkan received her M.A. in Cultural Studies at Sabanci University in 2014.