I am a visual-academic researcher exploring the layers of displacement and ecological loss in the north-eastern Mediterranean city Antakya, southern Turkey. My interests emerge from questions of entanglement and refusal within the material and affective realms of post-disaster urban settlement: how are narratives of resistance sustained under pressure of censorship and exclusion? What discourses of knowledge are considered valuable and are made accessible, and to whom? ?

I am currently conducting a Ph.D. foundation (M.Phil.) in Sociology at the University of Cambridge, where I am the co-founder and co-convenor of the Sociology, Film and Visual Art research cluster. I am likewise a junior teaching staff member in the Department of Geography at UCL, University of London since 2024.





No.910
48’, 2024 - Film
Released after a one-year research period that begun in the aftermath of the earthquakes, No.910 is a DIY documentary film exploring the affective and material impact of the February 2023 earthquakes in the wake of protracted state violence and civil ambivalence. Using footage captured over a constant twenty-four hour period in my paternal family’s neighbourhood of Affan (Antakya) October 2023, No.910 – both in the dialogue of the film as well as through the images captured from surrounding areas of the city’s central neighbourhood – act as testimony to the severity of the ecological and political collapse facing survivors. 

Screenings:

London (UK)Premiere at the Institute of Contemporary Art - 11.04.2024, followed by a Q&A discussion with BBC documentary filmmaker Sheida Kiran, and Erkan’s father Cemil Gürsel. This discussion is available to listen on Montez Press Radio.

Ankara (TR) Screening at the British Institute at Ankara - 16.05.2024, followed by a panel discussion moderated by Işılay Gürsu of the BIAA, featuring Gök Akyel, the film’s main producer, Pelin Anılan, the project and content advisor, and a representative from the American Research Institute in Turkey. 

Istanbul (TR) Screening at the Pera Museum, organised by DOCUMENTARIST (Istanbul Documentary Film Festival) 17th as part of the Domestic Film Selections Programme, followed by a brief Q&A with Gök Akyel (producer) and Erkan Gürsel 

Ankara (TR)Screening at the European Union Delegation to Türkiye’s 14th Human Rights Film Programme - 19.12.2024, followed by a discussion between Akif Türker (European Union Delegation to Türkiye), Dr. Tuğçe Tezer, and Gürsel.  

London (UK) Screening at the UK House of Commons with the Centre for Turkey Studies - 04.02.2025, followed by a discussion with Professor Joanna Walker (UCL Centre for Disaster and Risk Reduction), and Yörük Kurtaran (Treasurer of the Turkey Mozaik Foundation. 

Cambridge (UK) Screening at the Department of Sociology at the University of Cambridge, with the Sociology, Film and Visual Art Research Cluster - 01.05.2025, followed by a discussion between Dr. Zeina al-Azmeh, Sheida Kiran (BBC), and Erkan.

Lisbon (P) Screening of excerpt at Wierd Economies and Chaoid Collective: Summer School -29.08.2025, followed by discussion with Erkan.