Mehmet Günyeli

Mehmet Günyeli is a photographer born in Istanbul. His work falls into two bodies: colour photographs of people met on his travels, and conceptual series in black and white built around angels and dervishes.

He went to school at Saint Joseph Lycée in Istanbul and made photography his career in the 1980s, alongside a role in family businesses. For about two decades he pursued Yeryüzünün Renkleri (Colours of the Earth), recording societies that keep their own culture. The project produced the books Viva Cuba Libre and India. He travels alone when working and photographs people without asking. Around 2004 he turned to black and white and to conceptual work, moving from angels to dervishes before starting a series on mythological gods based on statues. He named the dervish project İnancın Dansı.

Photographs from the dervish series were shown at an art fair in Miami in December 2008, and the series had its first solo exhibition at C.A.M. Galeri, Istanbul, in March 2009. His work was included in A Selection of Turkish Art, organised by the Qatar Photographic Society at Katara Cultural Village, Doha, in 2015. In 2026 he has a solo exhibition at Nurol Sanat Galerisi, Ankara. He also collects photographs, postcards and stamps and is a founding member of the Ephemera Society in Turkey.