Fikret Bektaş

Fikret has a degree in Photography department at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University.
He has been taking photos and videos at weddings since he was 18. He is trying to make a living this way. But portraits are his passion, he likes to communicate with people. He is also good at music, he is playing drums and acoustic guitar as an amateur.

Fikret was diagnosed with schizophrenia when he was 37. He is complaining about the prejudices of the society and being stigmatized. “When people are insulting somebody, they say ‘Are you schizophrenic?’. So I conceal that I am schizophrenic” he says. That’s why he thinks that he cannot work at other jobs.

He really enjoyed being on the stage in Netherlands with the folk dancing group they founded. He says that the associations put a great support behind him to learn how to live with schizophrenia. For two years, he stayed at Tuzla Umut Evi, a pilot project in Türkiye. He liked the experience to live together with the other schizophrenics. He believes that schizophrenics need to be within the society.