Alumni Spotlight: Pinar Yorgancioglu '16
Alumni Spotlight is a place to hear from the School of the Arts alumni community about their journeys as artists and creators.
Pinar Yorgancioglu '16 is a fillmmaker and the owner of IndiBindi Film based in İstanbul. Her short film “Mrs. Nebile’s Wormhole” (2016) premiered at the Warsaw Film Festival and received awards from !f and İstanbul Film Festivals. “Prayers at Dawn” (2014) premiered at Palm Springs, and was nominated for the grand prize at Xining Film Festival. Together with Gregorio Mircea Franchetti, she created the web-series “The Art of Hospitality”, and sold the rights to Warner Music Group. She is an alumna of Biennale College Cinema, Sarajevo Talents, !f Screenwriting lab co-organized with the Sundance Institute, and Netflix SheShoots Fellowship. She works as an editor on the side, where her main editing credits include the Sundance-winning short, “Green.” She holds a masters degree in film directing from Columbia University.
Was there a specific faculty member or peer who especially inspired you while at the School of the Arts? If so, who and how?
I had so many amazing professors at Columbia, it’s hard to pick one. Both Tom Kalin and Eric Mendelsohn were very inspiring, influential, and somewhat complimentary to each other in the way they stimulated my artistic growth— Eric was incredibly helpful in pointing out my weaknesses and helping me tackle them one at a time; and Tom was truly amazing in helping me rediscover my strengths and allowing me to sharpen whatever was distinctive in the way I approached my work. Bradford Barnes forever changed the way I work with actors, and my notebook from Andy Bienen’s Elements of Dramatic Narrative class is still the first thing I go back to when I am writing.
What were the most pressing social/political issues on the minds of the students when you were here?
Institutionalized oppression worldwide. Flocking of the like-minded individuals; and growing polarization of the masses as a result. Post globalization.
What advice would you give to recent graduates?
Financing and making a feature takes quite long, so your collaborators are really people that will fight together with you against all odds. Make sure you have the necessary support system by choosing the right collaborators, and surrounding yourself with friends and family that love and respect who you are, and can bear the discomfort of giving you honest criticism when it's needed. And trust your gut—especially the years after graduation are inevitably messy, just mess it up on your own terms.