
ARTISTS / MUSTAFA AYAZ

MUSTAFA AYAZ
One of the prominent names in Contemporary Turkish Art, Mustafa Ayaz was born in 1938 in the village of Kabataş, district of Çaykara, at the province of Trabzon. His childhood which coincided with the crisis ridden years of the Second World War was spent struggling with poverty and the diseases. He first got the opportunity to go to school at the age of ten when he started to develop an interest in art. In 1953, he entered the Pulur Village Teacher’s School at the province of Erzurum. In the last year of the Secondary School he drew the attention of his teachers and was suggested that he should take the entrance examination to the Art Seminar of the Primary Teacher’s School at Çapa, Istanbul. He took the entrance examination and was successful. It was as early as then, when his course was determined. That course was to lead him to art. In 1959 he graduated from Çapa Primary Teacher’s School. After one year of teaching, he entered the Art Department of Gazi Teacher’s Training College and graduated in 1963. In the three years that followed, he taught art and headed the studio at the Çorum Primary Teacher’s School. In 1966 he passed the examination for assistantship at the Art Department of Gazi Teacher’s Training College and taught art here until 1984 when he transferred to the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Hacettepe and retired in 1987.
Having acquired the title of professorship in that same year he was appointed to the Faculty of Fine Arts of Bilkent University where, at the beginning of 1988 he resigned. After that he worked in his own studio. He held over sixty exhibitions in Turkey and received nineteen awards. He participated in a multitude of biennials and joint exhibitions in many countries like India, Kuwait, Egypt, Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Belgium, France, U.S. of America, England, Algeria and Germany. Hundreds of his works have found their way into collections abroad and thousands of his works are kept in domestic collections. Mustafa Ayaz has a museum in Ankara. Ayaz worked on printmaking at IMOGA in 2014. Mustafa Ayaz passed away in 2024.
www.mustafaayaz.com
Selected Exhibitions
Solo Exhibitions
1967 State Fine Arts Gallery, Ankara
1972 State Fine Arts Gallery, Ankara
1976 Artisan Art Gallery, Ankara
1977 State Fine Arts Gallery, Ankara
1980 Tiglat Art Gallery, Istanbul
1980 State Fine Arts Gallery, Ankara
1981 ODTU Exhibition Hall, Ankara
1983 Akbank Art Gallery, Istanbul
1984 Museum of Painting and Sculpture, Ankara
1984 Urart Art Gallery, Ankara
1987 Museum of Painting and Sculpture, Ankara
1988 Gorbon Art Gallery, Istanbul
1990 Atatürk Culture Center, Istanbul
1993 Kibele Art Gallery, Izmir
1993,1994 Doku Art Galleries, Ankara
1995,1996 Doku Art Galleries, Ankara
1995,1996 Kibele Art Gallery, Izmir
1996 S. Yaşar Art Gallery, Izmir
1997 Garanti Art Gallery, Istanbul
1999 S. Yaşar Art Gallery, Izmir
1999, 2000 Doku Art Galleries, Istanbul
2000, 2001 Doku Art Galleries, Ankara
2005 Doku Art Galleries, Ankara
2005 Doku Art Galleries, Istanbul
2005 S.Yaşar Art Gallery, Izmir
2007 Mustafa Ayaz Art Gallery, Ankara
2008 Doku Art Galleries, Istanbul
2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 Mustafa Ayaz Art Gallery, Ankara
Group Exhibitions
1972 Le IV. Festival International de la Peinture Cagnes-sur-mer
1973 Bulgaria Exhibition
1973 Iskenderiye Fair
1981 On the Occasion of the Centenary of Atatürk's Birth, An Exhibition of Turkish Painting, Amman
1981 On the Occasion of the Centenary of Atatürk's Birth, An Exhibition of Turkish Painting, Belgrad
1981 On the Occasion of the Centenary of Atatürk's Birth, An Exhibition of Turkish Painting, France
1981 On the Occasion of the Centenary of Atatürk's Birth, An Exhibition of Turkish Painting, USA
1981 Group Exhibition, Bonn-Germany
1982 Group Exhibition, Egypt
1982 5th Art Trienalle, India
1983 Exhibition of the Contemporary Turkish Paintings, Kuwait
1983 Group Exhibition, Romania
1983 Painting Exhibition, organized by the French Embassy
1984 Contemporary Turkish Art Exhibition, Algeria
1985 Contemporary Turkish Art Exhibition, Germany
1987 Wood Print Exhibition, Turkey and Germany
1989 Galerie Kutscha, Salzburg