Ayşe Polat
Ayşe Polat (* 19.10.1970 in Malatya) is a German-Kurdish film director, screenwriter and film producer. Life. Polat was born in 1970 in the capital of the province of Malatya in the Kurdish part of Turkey. In 1978 she relocated with her parents to Hamburg. At the age of 15, Ayşe Polat began filming on Super 8 and video. In 1991, she was awarded a prize for her social study "Entfremdet" at a german national youth and video contest. From 1990-1995 she studies philosophy, cultural studies and German language and literature at the FU Berlin and the University  of Bremen. In 2014/15 she is invited by the Tarabya Cultural Academy in Istanbul as an artist-in-residence. In 2017/18 follows another artist residency at the FU Berlin in the research group "Cinepoetics — Center for Advanced Film Studies". Career. In 1992 she releases the short film "Fremdennacht", which is supported by the Hamburg Film Bureau. Her 1994 short film wins several awards, including the WDR sponsorship prize. "Gräfin Sophia Hatun" (1997) also tours several international festivals and receives the Special Jury Prize at the Ankara International Film Festival. Her feature film debut "" (1999) toured numerous international festivals and partook  in the international competition of Karlovy Vary and Tokyo. Polat received the award for best directorial debut at the Ankara International Film Festival. Her second feature film "" (2004) was screened as the Locarno Film Festival opening film and received the Silver Leopard for Best Film and Best Actresses, Maria Kwiatkowsky and Pinar Erincin. In 2005, Polat received the German Critics Award for "En Garde". In 2006, Polat directed her first theater work "Otobüs" at Berlin's Theater Hebbel am Ufer (HAU 2). The play deals with the kidnapping of a group of German package tourists in Turkey. Polat co-produced  her third feature film "LUKS GLÜCK". The tragicomedy tells the story of a Turkish family between Hamburg and Istanbul, whose life is thrown off course when they win the lottery. In 2013, her film "", which she also produced, premiered at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. The film deals with the return of a young woman from Germany back to the home country of her deceased father.   Her first documentary "The Others" is completed in 2016 and has its international premiere at DOK Leipzig. Reception. Polat belongs to the first wave of young Turkish filmmakers at the end of the nineties . Her Kurdish heritage allows the young filmmaker a different approach to themes of belonging and origin. "A people whose language was forbidden for so long certainly has a different approach to pictorial metaphors." As one of the few German filmmakers with a history of migration, she is represented at the retrospective of the 69th Berlin International Film Festival, which focuses on the filmmaking of female directors in the period from 1968 to 1999. In her cinematic work, Polat deals with themes of the search and loss of identity. Her work is associated with the Berlin School. Being a director of  films that belong to the so-called German-Turkish cinema, Ayşe Polat is particularly involved with the political relevance of a poiesis of seeing films, as it becomes most apparent when a minority position is placed in relation to the context of a hegemonic entertainment culture. Awards. Federal Youth and Video Competition Award Award of the West German Broadcast Ankara International Film Festival International Film Festival Locarno Otto Sprenger Directing Award German Critics Award German Cinema New Talent Award Beyond Borders Documentary Film Festival DOK. Leipzig