Featured Interview With Sonja and Esin Tanrisever
Tell us a little about yourself. Where were you raised? Where do you live now?
Sonja: I grew up in Sweden, green forests had always welcomed my long walks. Though it has been almost half a century, 50 years that I’m in Istanbul. I am mainly in Istanbul but make trips to Sweden, have also lived in California for some time (in San Fransisco Bay Area and I miss there, would be nice to make some trips again to the States again). Right now we don’t have any pets, our last dog died because of age and we can’t dare to get a new one because we may move to live in Sweden ike my son and the family, or elsewhere, we don’t know yet.
Esin: I was born in and grew up in Istanbul but had been back and forth between Sweden and Turkey. Also have lived in the States for sometime with my family, when my father was still alive and he had founded a company over there, for realising his inventions of medical projects
Upon pets; same as above, right now I am living with my mother and can not dare to own another pet not before being dedicated to live at a certain place
At what age did you realize your fascination with books? When did you start writing?
Sonja: “When I wrote ‘Cultural Bridges’, I was at 61. 3-4 years after that, wrote ‘Traces of Living’, a retrospective journey of my art production and very lately in cooperation with my daughter, wrote the ‘Free Art Learning With Kids’. But I started writing very long time ago, when I was 15 years old and still have tones of notes here and there. Only with a bit of work, many outcomes may burst.”
Esin: “I started writing when I was 5, right at the time I learned writing, started my short stories, then within time short stories evolved to articles, longer stories, observations, thewn turned back to short stories, and the last one is an educative book on art education wit5h kids from 2 to 7 years of age and our target audience is parents, teachers and teacher candidates. I have many short stories.
Right now with my mother, we want to write series of booklets which will make up a a library on art education with kids; especially on different techniques of art. In the meanwhile, I may publish either own rescue experiences from earthquakes as a volunteer rescuer, or collect some of the short stories I had written in decades, and let them make up a book, then another and so on”
Who are your favorite authors to read? What is your favorite genre to read. Who Inspires you in your writings?
My favorite book of all time;
Esin: Gabriel Garcia Marquez 100 Years of Solitude
Sonja: Rainer Maria Rilke, The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge
If I was going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with me what books would I bring?
Esin: Gabriel Garcia Marquez – 100 Years of Solitude, Jack London’s Martin Eden, one book from Dostoyevsky.
Sonja: Rainer Maria Rilke- The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, Hermean Hesse’s Siddhartha, one book from Nazim Hikmet
Every member of our nuclear family has read several thousands of books in life time (Esin: mine is the least since I am the youngest) and it’s hard to write my/our favorite genre to read. One has ‘periods’ in life ‘tastes’! may change from time to time and many different genres are nice. It’s just so bad that we may not be able to read tens of thousands of books in a life time. More over, we will never know what we miss from the ones we haven’t read
Tell us a little about your latest book?
“Free Art Learning With Kids” is an introduction to our understanding of art educational philosophy for young ones. In it, we have sporadically pondered upon some topics that we believe may concern adults who particularly are in relation to children at early stages between 2 till 7 years of age. (Views upon ourselves… Children… The World and the like.) Let’s consider the scientifically proven fact that as much as 90% of children’s personalities get completed at the age of 6!.. Very much can, according to our understanding, should be done in order to support process of developing self confidence and individual growth in children while their brains are most receptive
The target audience is parents, close relatives/ones to preschool kids or educators/students who want to make contribution with art education. It is planned to get followed by a series of handbooks which will come to form a “library” containing instructive guidelines upon how we, as adults, can support our children by providing them means to expand their personal creative growths. You will find detailed descriptions on how various artistic media techniques can get successfully realized together with them
Our planned “Free Art Learning With Kids Library” Project program introduces a rich variety of artistical techniques with instructions on how to apply them adapted to “young artists”. Following books will be on branches. (Just with a brainstorm came out over 20 headlines, right now we are in the middle of 2nd book)
For further information upon our book, please click the link: http://www.freeartlearning.com/2018/07/12/upon-sonja-bohlander-esin-tanrisever-and-their-book-free-art-learning-with-kids/
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