Cevdet Mehmet Kösemen (born 18 May 1984), also known by his former

pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

Nemo Ramjet, is a Turkish researcher, artist, and author. Kosemen is known for his artwork, depicting living and extinct animals as well as

surrealist Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

scenes, and his writings on

paleoart Paleoart (also spelled palaeoart, paleo-art, or paleo art) is any original artistic work that attempts to depict prehistoric life according to scientific evidence. Works of paleoart may be representations of fossil remains or imagined depiction ...

speculative evolution Speculative evolution is a genre of speculative fiction and an artistic movement focused on hypothetical scenarios in the evolution of life, and a significant form of fictional biology. It is also known as speculative biology and it is referred ...

, and history and culture in Turkey. Together with Australian paleoartist

John Conway John Horton Conway (26 December 1937 – 11 April 2020) was an English mathematician active in the theory of finite groups, knot theory, number theory, combinatorial game theory and coding theory. He also made contributions to many branches ...

and British paleontologist

Darren Naish Darren William Naish is a British vertebrate palaeontologist, author and science communicator. As a researcher, he is best known for his work describing and reevaluating dinosaurs and other Mesozoic reptiles, including '' Eotyrannus'', ''Xeno ...

, Kosemen co-authored ''

All Yesterdays ''All Yesterdays: Unique and Speculative Views of Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Animals'' is a 2012 art book Artists' books (or book arts or book objects) are works of art that utilize the form of the book. They are often published in small ...

'', a 2012 book exploring speculative ideas in

, and ''Cryptozoologicon'', a book applying speculative evolution ideas to

cryptids Cryptids are animals that cryptozoologists believe may exist somewhere in the wild, but are not believed to exist by mainstream science. Cryptozoology is a pseudoscience, which primarily looks at anecdotal stories, and other claims rejected b ...

, both of which were widely covered in international media. Among Kosemen's most known personal speculative evolution projects are the book ''

All Tomorrows ''All Tomorrows: A Billion Year Chronicle of the Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man'' is a 2006 work of science fiction and speculative evolution written and illustrated by the Turkish artist C. M. Kosemen under the pen name Nemo Ramjet. It ...

'' (2006) and the ongoing project

Snaiad Snaiad is a speculative evolution, science fiction and artistic worldbuilding project by Turkish artist C. M. Kosemen, focused on a fictional exoplanet of the same name. Begun in the early 2000s and inspired by earlier works such as Wayne Barlo ...

Background

Cevdet Mehmet Kösemen was born in

Ankara Ankara ( , ; ), historically known as Ancyra and Angora, is the capital of Turkey. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5.1 million in its urban center and over 5.7 million in Ankara Province, mak ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

in 1984. After attending Koç High School (

Istanbul Istanbul ( , ; tr, İstanbul ), formerly known as Constantinople ( grc-gre, Κωνσταντινούπολις; la, Constantinopolis), is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, ...

) with obtaining an

International Baccalaureate The International Baccalaureate (IB), formerly known as the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO), is a nonprofit foundation headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, and founded in 1968. It offers four educational programmes: the IB ...

with high honours in 2002, he studied at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to ...

(

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

) between 2002 and 2003, and at

Sabancı University Sabancı University ( tr, Sabancı Üniversitesi), established in 1994, is a young foundation university located on a 1.26 million squaremeter campus which is about 40 km from Istanbul's city center. Its first students matriculated in 1999. ...

(

) between 2003 and 2007, where he obtained a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...

degree in Visual Arts and Communication Design. Kosemen subsequently went to

Goldsmiths College Goldsmiths, University of London, officially the Goldsmiths' College, is a constituent research university of the University of London in England. It was originally founded in 1891 as The Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute by the Wor ...

(

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

) in 2007, from which he achieved a

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. ...

degree in Documentary Film and Media Studies in 2008. He has worked as an editor for the magazine ''

Colors Color (American English) or colour (British English) is the visual perceptual property deriving from the spectrum of light interacting with the photoreceptor cells of the eyes. Color categories and physical specifications of color are associa ...

'' by Benetton and in several different advertising agencies. From a young age, Kosemen was interested in paleontology, extinct animals and evolutionary history, envisioned by him as a way to explore "strange creatures and strange worlds". Kosemen is also interested in visual culture and Mediterranean history. His interests were encouraged by his parents and his grandfather, who on international trips bought him several books on animals. Among Kosemen's favorite literature growing up was the

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imagination, imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, Paral ...

books of

Olaf Stapledon William Olaf Stapledon (10 May 1886 – 6 September 1950) – known as Olaf Stapledon – was a British philosopher and author of science fiction.Andy Sawyer, " illiamOlaf Stapledon (1886-1950)", in Bould, Mark, et al, eds. ''Fifty Key Figure ...

, books on obscure cinema by

Pete Tombs Pete Tombs is a British author, television and film producer, and co-founder of the American-based home video distribution company Mondo Macabro, which he established in 2002 alongside fellow co-founder Andy Starke. Tombs also co-founded the pr ...

, and books part of the former ''Star Wars'' Expanded Universe. Kosemen learned English through textbooks on biology and zoology as well as through ''Star Wars'' books. Literature Kosemen has also cited as influential for him includes

Larry Niven Laurence van Cott Niven (; born April 30, 1938) is an American science fiction writer. His best-known works are '' Ringworld'' (1970), which received Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards, and, with Jerry Pournelle, '' The Mote in God's ...

's ''

Ringworld ''Ringworld'' is a 1970 science fiction novel by Larry Niven, set in his Known Space universe and considered a classic of science fiction literature. ''Ringworld'' tells the story of Louis Wu and his companions on a mission to the Ringworld, a ...

'' series,

Arthur C. Clarke Sir Arthur Charles Clarke (16 December 191719 March 2008) was an English science-fiction writer, science writer, futurist, inventor, undersea explorer, and television series host. He co-wrote the screenplay for the 1968 film '' 2001: A Spac ...

's science fiction works, and

Jack L. Chalker Jack Laurence Chalker (December 17, 1944 – February 11, 2005) was an American science fiction author. Chalker was also a Baltimore City Schools history teacher in Maryland for 12 years, retiring during 1978 to write full-time. He also was a ...

Well World series The Well World series is a series of science fiction novels by Jack L. Chalker. It involves a planet-sized supercomputer known as the Well of Souls that builds our reality on top of an underlying one of greater complexity but smaller size. The c ...

Career

Artwork

Kosemen's artwork ranges from scientifically accurate depictions of prehistoric life to surrealist paintings. Kosemen's surrealist art combines elements of "imaginary spirits" and "mythological environments". In 2010, Kosemen met Kerimcan Güleryüz, head of an art exhibition project called the Empire Project, which prompted him to further explore symbolism in art. Kosemen remains affiliated with the Empire Project Gallery in Istanbul as an artist. Since 2010, Kosemen's artwork has been the subject of several exhibitions in Istanbul, such as the exhibition "Sanctuary" which was held at the art space in the quarter

Karaköy Karaköy (), the modern name for the old Galata, is a commercial quarter in the Beyoğlu district of Istanbul, Turkey, located at the northern part of the Golden Horn mouth on the European side of Bosphorus. Karaköy is one of the oldest and ...

called Space Debris from January 19 to February 17 of 2018. Kosemen typically completes one large research book and two art exhibits every year. In addition to exhibitions in Turkey, Kosemen's art has also been displayed internationally in Italy, Austria, Montenegro, England and Israel.

Writing

In 2012, Kosemen co-authored the book ''

'' with Australian paleoartist

and British paleontologist

. The book, which garnered wide attention and positive reviews, explores speculative ideas in

, art reconstructing prehistoric animals. Conway and Kosemen began working on the book together after they realized that a vast majority of modern dinosaur artwork did not really portray dinosaurs as real animals, ignoring features such as various type of soft tissue (e.g. skin flaps, pouches, fat) that are unlikely to have survived through fossilization. Both ''All Yesterdays'' and Conways's, Naish's and Kosemen's later book ''Cryptozoologicon'' were widely featured in the media. In 2011, Kosemen discovered that he is descended from

Dönmeh The Dönme ( he, דוֹנְמֶה, Dōnme, ota, دونمه, tr, Dönme) were a group of Sabbatean crypto-Jews in the Ottoman Empire who converted outwardly to Islam, but retained their Jewish faith and Kabbalistic beliefs in secret. The ...

, Jews forced to convert to Islam in the 17th century. He published a book about them, ''Osman Hasan and the Tombstone Photographs of the Dönmes'', in 2014. This book was purchased by several leading research institutes and universities worldwide and won Kosemen the Eduard-Duckesz History Prize in 2016. Kosemen's 2018 book ''The Disappearing City'', explores and collects photographs of 20th century Turkish street signs and architecture in Istanbul. Describing the book, Kosemen has stated that it came about since Istanbul is rapidly replacing its 20th century buildings and that the city as such is "losing some valuable buildings of a type that are being preserved in, say, Tel Aviv". Kosemen has garnered attention for his work within the

genre. In 2006, he published the book ''

'' online as a free

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

file. ''All Tomorrows'' explores a speculative billion-year future history of humanity and its descendants and experienced a surge in online popularity in 2021. Kosemen is also known for his "

project, which explores a fictional alien world called Snaiad, with a diverse ecosystem of creatures designed by Kosemen himself. Kosemen hopes to eventually publish Snaiad as a book.

''Tangent Realms''

A documentary about C. M. Kosemen and his work, titled ''Tangent Realms: The Worlds of C. M. Kösemen'' and directed by indie filmmaker Kevin Schreck, was released in 2018. The film explores not only Kosemen's art, but also his personal life and questions he and other people face at some point in their lives. The film received awards at several indie film festivals.

Bibliography

Speculative biology and paleontology

* 2006 '' All Tomorrows: A Billion Year Chronicle of the Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man'' * 2012 '' All Yesterdays: Unique and Speculative Views of Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Animals'', with John Conway and Darren Naish * 2013 ''All Your Yesterdays: Extraordinary Visions of Extinct Life by a New Generation of Palaeoartists'' (free

e-book An ebook (short for electronic book), also known as an e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in digital form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. Al ...

) * 2013 ''Cryptozoologicon: The Biology, Evolution, and Mythology of Hidden Animals'', with John Conway and Darren Naish

Culture and history in Turkey

* 2013 ''Nişanyan House, a Photographic Essay'' * 2014 ''Osman Hasan and the Tombstone Photographs of the Dönmes'' * 2018 ''The Bodrum Jewish Cemetery'' * 2018 ''The Disappearing City: Hand-Painted Apartment Signs and Architectural Details from 20th-Century Istanbul'' * 2018 ''A Karakaş Speaks: Interviews with a Member of Turkey’s Crypto-Judaic “Dönme” Sect'' * 2019 ''Memories and Stories of Bodrum's Jewish Community'' * 2019 ''Hatıratlarda Türkiye Yahudileri'', with Rıfat N. Bali * 2020 ''Memoirs of an Istanbul Psychiatrist'', translated and edited

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobio ...

s of Turkish

neuropsychiatrist Neuropsychiatry or Organic Psychiatry is a branch of medicine that deals with psychiatry as it relates to neurology, in an effort to understand and attribute behavior to the interaction of neurobiology and social psychology factors. Within neurop ...

Henri Griladze * 2021 ''Forests of the Afterlife: Folk Art and Symbolism in Village Cemeteries of Turkey's Bodrum-Milas Peninsula''

Art collections

* 2016 ''Tangent Worlds: From the Sketchbooks of C. M. Kosemen'' (free e-book) * 2019 ''Alternate Life: From the Online Sketchbooks of C. M. Kosemen'' (free e-book) * 2020 ''Decade: Surreal Artworks by C. M. Kosemen'' (free e-book)

References

External links

C. M. Kosemen's website

C. M. Kosemen's youtube channel, featuring his own podcast

Website of Kosemen's "Snaiad" project
Talk about Snaiad and designing alien lifeforms by Kosemen on YouTube

Website for the film ''Tangent Realms''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kosemen, C. M. 1984 births People from Ankara Living people Paleoartists Turkish artists Turkish photographers Sabancı University alumni Cornell University alumni Alumni of Goldsmiths, University of London Turkish people of Jewish descent Artists from Istanbul