The BERG born as Berk Tuncer (01.01.1998) is a Munich/Istanbul based conceptual artist.
BERG was born in a household on the verge of enjoying their cheeses and wines but shortly cut
off on the new years’ eve of 1997 passing through 1998. The birth was accompanied by lots of
Christmas desserts and a huge c-section on his mother’s belly. The household that accompanied
this early arrival of BERG mainly consisted of three generations of ladies which created the family
structure out of pure matriarchy.
These four ladies that had a huge role in BERG’s life were his mother, grandmother, the sister of
the grandmother, and the great-grandmother. These unique characters composed a relatively
calm and knotted id for BERG which still to this day offered him the chance to taste the different
types of cultures of Istanbul.
The house he spent his childhood was located in a neighborhood that was stationed in between
old Byzantium walls of the city. These archival structures reinforced his connection to his roots
and made him aware of the historical traces of the city which left the impression on him of the
state of belongingness to his surroundings.
His family which was mainly formed out of doctors and soldiers also had a sense of awareness
and practicality for art. The family usually as a post-retirement approach holds on to painting,
more precisely nature-mort. Under all of the influences, it was inevitable for him to also practice
art in any form; which in his case was painting. By the age of three, one artist relative of The
BERG took him to her atelier and placed an empty canvas in from of him. This was his first
encounter with the materialized version of painting.
By the age of seven, his family sent him to an oil painting course which was thrown by a rather
classical oil painter. It was at this moment that the oil paint itself captured his attention in the best
way possible.
He commenced practicing nature-morts, flowers, and landscapes on canvas yet this early age of
the traditional way of oil painting also created a sense of ennui in the BERG.
As the years passed by, his relation with painting transformed itself into a love and hate relation.
He was experimenting but never getting satisfied. He titled the painting itself as an old man. He
expressed his feeling towards painting as:“ Painting is like having sex with an old man. He is
never satisfied, grumpy and so hard to change. He just lays on the bed, demands more and
more.”
After years of this connection with painting he was on the verge of a state of fright to choose art
as a career and being too one-dimensional more importantly repetitive. This outcome of constant
accompaniment of concern continued as a small study in Istanbul which didn’t satisfy him at all.
Therefore this newly created artist took on a search of pure motivation, lots of cigarettes, and two
broken sunglasses. The search for belongingness ended up in the city of Munich: A replacement
which he could have never imagined.
As his last year started to come to an end in Istanbul he packed everything he could; the city, the
chaos, the culture, and tried to get inspired by them in Munich. He aimed to epitomize his
belongings yet it was cut off short without the fuelling power of the chaotic city. Munich was
simply too calm.
BERG is now concretized his works evolving around the state of blatant egoism and its outcome
as his brand. In other words, he is still concerned with the subject of surroundings yet this time
the surroundings have altered themselves in the appearance of a new reflection. Therefore BERG
started the state his new argument only this time it wasn’t old Levantine buildings that created the
BERG yet how BERG created himself in the novelty of Munich.