Echoes

Type: Exhibition
Year: 2025
Size: 255 m²
Location: New York / USA
Client: Şule Yüksel Şenler Foundation + The Shabazz Center
Team: Yasemin D. Karaca, Asude A. Yılmaz, Beyza Kurt
Status: Completed

The Echoes exhibition brings together two figures from different geographies and eras—Malcolm X and Şule Yüksel Şenler—highlighting the challenges they faced in their societies due to faith and identity, and uniting their calls for justice on a shared ground.

The spatial design was conceived to support this conceptual framework through layered arrangements. At the entrance, a double-sided poster superimposes the portraits of Malcolm and Şule; as visitors move, one face transforms into the other, visualizing the idea of “echo”.

The exhibition unfolds through a series of thematic sections. Malcolm’s Way / Şule’s Way presents the parallels and divergences in their life trajectories through black-and-white photographs. Malcolm’s Fire / Şule’s Light, designed as a “room of words,” features selected excerpts from their speeches combined into a shared manifesto, with AI technology recreating their voices to recite the text together. The Call merges two archival photographs of Malcolm and Şule addressing large crowds from nearly identical angles, allowing the viewer to see either figure depending on their position, and includes an interactive podium and microphone where visitors can deliver their own speeches on justice. Finally, Malcolm’s Heart / Şule’s Mind displays their personal letters, sketches, and collages alongside a writing desk that invites visitors to compose their own letters, which are collected in a dedicated archive.

At the core of the architectural design lies the idea of transforming individual voices into a collective resonance. The superimposition of photographs, texts, and voices, and the blending of figures, communities, and even physical spaces, embody what the title Echoes suggests: the amplification of these calls across time and place.