M HKA Ensembles

° 1987

Born in Vienna (AT), based in Antwerp (BE).

Imge Özbilge (°1987, Austria) has lived successively in Austria, Spain, Turkey and the Netherlands. She resides in Antwerp since 2014. After obtaining her bachelor in arts from Istanbul Bilgi University, she first continued her master studies at the St.-Joost Academy in the Netherlands, then at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent.

The starting point of her work is always the exploration and bringing together of two apparently opposing visual worlds with which she came into contact throughout her life: those of 'East' and 'West'. During her research into the possibilities of visualising Eastern mythologies today, Özbilge developed a passion for miniature art. She combines the latter with a sense of surrealism and grotesque absurdity into storylines in which reality and fantasy, past and present merge. In terms of content, Özbilge is inspired by current events in the Middle East and by the conflict between the modern and the traditional on the one hand, and freedom and emancipation on the other. These contradictions cause her work to balance on the line between a reminiscent daydream and a political message.