Summer of 2013 was a time of intense and mixed emotions. It was a time of great togetherness and solidarity; as well as violence, brutality, misery and death. What started as a small protest against the demolition of Gezi Park, one of the last remaining green areas of central Istanbul, was met by non-proportional use of force and police brutality. The use of excessive force and the deliberate lack of negotiation, soon turned that little protest into one of the greatest civil uprisings in Turkish history.

The demands were compiled by a group of civilians concerned with a larger number of floating demands creating a clarity problem. They stuck with the original demands first developed by Taksim Solidarity, with the aim of making visible the tangible, clear demands. 

These were 5 main demands, and the group wanted to visualize and spread them as wide as possible. I was contacted for this task and gladly started working. During the design process, Taksim Solidarity and TMMOB were contacted and they adopted these visualizations for their marching placards. The end result was my proudest work to this date. 
The demands were simple:

1) Gezi must stay as a park.
2) Governors and the police chiefs, and everyone who gave orders for, enforced or implemented violent repression must resign.
3) Teargas bombs and other similar materials must be prohibited.
4) Detained citizens must be immediately released.
5) All the meeting and demonstration bans effecting all squares and public areas must be abolished and stopped.

I turned these demands into simple stickers and leaflets so they would attract attention and would be easy to remember. They were massively produced and distributed. Radikal, one of the leading newspapers in Turkey at the time, wrote an article on how these demands were now available at every copier in town, for people to reproduce them by themselves. 
The demands were translated to 5 different languages
Facebook cover photo
We also did some stuff that we could not print. Since it was aimed to keep the demands simple and memorable, it was decided to keep the number at 5. So one of the major criticisms was that the demands were not broad enough. As a way to compensate for that, we designed empty stickers that were labeled "My Other Demands". The goal was to create a desk at the park where people would come and write their own demands with markers. 
As the original 5 demands were now widely known, this would've been more appropriate way to show the diversity of the protesters. However, those were very busy days with little sleep and this idea somehow slipped through without ever being finalized.

Overall, it was a great honor and privilege to have a major role in such a pivotal event in Turkish history, a protest that I strongly believe in and support.

You can find the pdf files for the stickers and leaflets here and here.
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