Interview: Eva Barbara Bongard & Vesile Yilmaz

Vesile Yilmaz is a traditional Ebru artist from Turkey, based in Wisconsin. Vesile describes Ebru as an art that is mesmerizing, meditative and meaningful that allows you to create mind blowing patterns with one drop of paint at a time!

Getting together was a great idea as Vesile was looking for a versatile material where she could print her beautiful patters and I was looking to give live to different uses of the leather. Our knowledge and passions merge fantasticly and the Museum of Wisconsin Art (MOWA) liked the pieces we have created together.

Vesile prints the piece of leather and I develop and create a product according to the piece of leather and patterns that she has created.

The pieces are being featured and sold at the MOWA.

LN: How would you describe your passion for Leather?

I am a very passionate person in general, I am dedicated, hard working, and I have the willingness to learn in the process even when I fail over and over. I find particularly fascinating our leather industry in many ways, it is so exciting to create new products, to develop textures and trends with a natural material I also have found a sense of true purpose participating and advocating for an industry that is solving a problem by using a by-product from the food industry that would otherwise go to waste.

LN: Why do you think leather is such a unique material?

Leather is unique because is natural, a byproduct of the food industry, durable, luxury, versatile and overall sustainable when follows the best practices.

LN: How did you came to the idea of this artwork?

The product is created after I received the piece of marbled leather. First I created a clutch as when I saw the marbled piece it was so unique and I love to use unique pieces when I go for a wedding or to special events.

I am all about using leather in homes or offices in different and unique ways so when I got the second piece of marble leather I decided to create a piece that can be practical but at the same time unique for an office. MOWA liked to be able to display the versitality of the pieces.

LN: What inspires you to use leather and what makes leather so special for you?

The fact that the leather is a byproduct of the food industry and using it we avoid to create other oil/petroleum based products is what makes it special for me.