Opening Remembering Otherwise (2025) at Framer Framed. Photo by Ben Yau. 28 Oct 2025
19:00 - 21:30
The Work of Contextualising
The conversation focuses on contextualisation of belit sağ’s research, rooted in engagement with personal and collective archives, leading to the creation of the solo exhibition Remembering Otherwise and situating it within the wider history of photography, weaving and moving images through texts. Drawing on texts by Almudena Escobar Lopez and Evrim Kaya, the discussion examines how acts of retelling and remembering open space for challenging dominant narratives and reimagining the role of the image. The conversation is moderated by Özge Calafato.
sağ’s five-year-long archival research into the 1978 Veghel labor dispute culminated into several works that use the collage technique in multiple media, underlining the fragmented, relational and multifaceted ways historical events as such are remembered by the people who lived through them, while centralising the stories and their subjects.
19:00 – 19:30 Meeting in front of the tapestry Weaving Solidarity for an introduction by belit sağ (entrance via StadsLoket Oost).
19:30 – 21:00 Conversation with Almudena Escobar Lopez and Evrim Kaya, moderated by Özge Calafato
21:00 – 21:30 Drinks
Register here.
Entrance via Stadsloket Oost
Oranje-Vrijstaatplein 2
About the exhibition
Presented at Framer Framed from 2 October to 12 November 2025, Remembering Otherwise is a solo exhibition by artist belit sağ. Conceived in close collaboration with curator Katia Krupennikova, the exhibition gives form to stories from a pivotal 1978 labour dispute in Veghel, North Brabant, led by migrant women workers from Turkey. These stories are brought together in a monumental tapestry, complemented by a multi-channel video installation and collages informed by the artist’s archival research process.
The dispute emerged when sixty-five women working at Veghel’s onion peeling factory resisted exploitative conditions: erratic hours, suffocating workspaces with no ventilation, no paid leave, and wages calculated by the kilo of onions peeled rather than by the hour. Supported by organiser Leyla İleri of Stichting Welzijn Buitenlandse Werknemers, the women unionised with FNV Voedingsbond, marking one of the first unionisations by migrant women in Dutch labour history.
Through weaving, moving images, and collaged stills, Remembering Otherwise transforms intangible memories, gestures, and sensory fragments into layered tactile and visual forms. sağ reimagines the women’s stories beyond the fragmented and decontextualised traces left in institutional archives, bringing forward moments of collective struggle and solidarity.
The impressive 7-metre by 3.5-meter tapestry designed by sağ and based on archival materials, is displayed in the Municipality Office of Amsterdam East, connecting the location with the adjacent project space of Framer Framed and making this history accessible to a wide Amsterdam audience.
Amsterdam – home to both sağ and İleri, a first-generation migrant from Turkey – is a city where migrant communities from Turkey have historically played an important role. The city anchors the exhibition, connecting the struggles of Veghel to the contemporary and historical struggles of migrant women’s communities in the city’s East, which sağ also came across during her research.
Crucially, the project emphasises revisiting the archive in dialogue with those who lived these histories. Non-verbal cues, gestures, and sensory memories take precedence over linear narrative; relationships and lived experience remain central. By reclaiming archives from institutions into public and embodied forms, sağ invites viewers into a conversation on labour, migration, resilience, and intergenerational dialogue.
Presented across two sites – the Municipality Office of Amsterdam East and Framer Framed – the exhibition expands the discourse on archives, labour, and migration histories in the Netherlands, while opening space for shared reflection and dialogue.
Credits
Artist: belit sag
Curator: Katia Krupennikova
Graphic design: Sarp Sozdinler
Remembering Otherwise is supported by the TextielMuseum Tilburg, Amsterdam Fund for the Arts (AFK), Mondriaan Fund, Gemeente Amsterdam Stadsdeel Oost, SAHA Association, Stichting Amarte Fonds and PPO Werktuig.
This event is in English. Admission is free.
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This event may be photographed and filmed. Kindly let us know in advance if you prefer not to have your picture taken. For seated programmes, places are always made available for wheelchair users. Please speak to the host before the programme begins.
Framer Framed is supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science; Amsterdam Fund for the Arts; Municipality of Amsterdam; and VriendenLoterij Fonds.
Diaspora / Feminism / Shared Heritage / The living archive / Textile / Turkey /
Exhibitions
Exhibition: Remembering Otherwise
Solo exhibition by artist belit sağ in collaboration with curator Katia Krupennikova on a pivotal 1978 labour dispute led by migrant women workers from Turkey
Agenda
Finissage: Remembering Otherwise
Finissage of the exhibition Remembering Otherwise, diving into the story of three migrant women workers from Turkey
Network
Özge Calafato
Evrim Kaya
Almudena Escobar López
