Meet Rıza Türker | Illustrator

We had the good fortune of connecting with Rıza Türker and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Rıza, what makes you happy? Why?
To be understood… When someone understands the meaning behind what I say or draw, I take a break from feeling alone for a while. Then I continue to create for people who understand me.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I have been drawing since I was almost 2 years old and it has become my job, my hobby, my love, my everything. The country I live in requires you to be a real fighter to survive by drawing. Drawing continues to be seen as a simple profession, a childish hobby and we are often asked to work for free, to do favors. It really took me years to overcome this and prove myself and show that I exist in the market. Even though I have been drawing since 1983, it was only after 2017 that people started to know the name “Rıza Türker”. I enjoy sharing everything I have experienced, struggled and practiced on this path with young illustrators.

Humor magazines, comics and manga have been indispensable for me since the day I learned to read. My style is like a combination of all three. I love creating strange compositions with cute but unusual characters, drawing superheroes as children or creating scary content. In addition to these, emotional moments, mental problems and breaking points are other subjects that I feed on.

If I have the opportunity one day, I would like to draw variant comic book covers for a publishing house. I think this is one of the most important dreams that I haven’t realized.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Located in the middle of Turkey, kilometers away from the sea, Ankara is not a touristic city, but it has many parks, lakesides and museums to visit. There are also some great comic book shops in the city. Jedbang and Goril are two of the most important ones. There are also very successful places to eat and drink. I think we would have something to eat somewhere, then visit the comic book shops, sit in one of the large parks in the heart of the city with the magazines we bought and complete the day. There is also Anıtkabir, where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the true leader of the Turks, lies in the heart of Ankara. It would definitely be a stop we would make.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Growing up in the 80s in an undeveloped city with nothing to do led me to dream a lot and paint these dreams. In this adventure, especially my grandmother made me fall in love with drawing with her limited talent. And the comic books my cousin left behind when he moved away guaranteed that drawing would be more than just a hobby for me. Luckily, I had a childhood friend with the same tastes and years later we both studied art at university.

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