Updates
In Their Words: The Flying Carpet Festival’s Sahba Aminikia
Late last year, the Flying Carpet Festival was honored with an Aga Khan Music Award, given to organizations that display “exceptional creativity, promise, and enterprise in music performance, creation, education, preservation and revitalisation in societies across the world in which Muslims have a significant presence.” Founded in 2018, the Flying Carpet Festival is a traveling artist residency, or mobile festival, based in southeast Turkey but operating in many of that region’s conflict areas. Having first covered their work last year, The Ensemble recently spoke with Founder Sahba Aminikia about receiving the award, working in areas of conflict and displacement, and how he is learning and growing alongside the program.
Flying Carpet Festival 2026 Unveils Global Lineup
The Flying Carpet Festival is proud to announce the full artist lineup for its 2026 edition, scheduled to take place from August 21 through September 1, 2026, near the Turkish Syrian border. As the world’s first mobile festival specifically designed for children living in conflict zones, Flying Carpet 2026 will convene a diverse collective of 40 artists from 20 countries, reinforcing its mission to create a vibrant, border-crossing platform for artistic exchange, dialogue, and cross-cultural solidarity.
Şehre Umut Verenler - 6. Bölüm
Bir karavanla başlayan yolculuk, binlerce çocuğun hayatına dokunan bir umuda dönüştü. Pınar Demiral’ın hayali, Mardin’de Sirkhane oldu. Bugün Sirkhane’den yetişen gençler, yeni gelen çocuklara ilham oluyor.Sanatla büyüyen bu hikâye, Mardin’den umut yaymaya devam ediyor. Pınar Demiral’ın ilham veren yolculuğunu, Sirkhane’nin büyüsünü ve hayallerini yeniden kuran çocukları izlediğimiz “Şehre Umut Verenler” 6. bölümüyle TOD’da!
Our Flying Carpet Festival Founder Among Winner Of Aga Khan Music Award 2025
We are deeply honored to share that our festival and its founder, Sahba Aminikia, have been selected as one of the winners of the 2025 Aga Khan Music Award "for visionary creativity in founding and guiding the Flying Carpet Festival, which draws on the transformative power of art and music to enrich the lives of children in conflict zones" - a recognition that belongs not only to us but to everyone who has walked alongside this journey of sound, hope, and magic, including artists, Sirkhane Social Circus School and our donors and supporters.
Flying Carpet Festival 2026 | Turkish–Syrian Border | August 21–September 1, 2026
🎪 Flying Carpet Festival 2026 📍 Mardin, Türkiye – Turkish–Syrian Border 📅 August 21 – September 1, 2026 🌍 8th Edition https://www.flyingcarpetfestival.com/... 3.5 million refugees. Millions of forgotten children. Every year, 50 artists from 20 countries unite to bring back color, music, stories, circus, dance, laughter, and hope to one of the world’s most fragile borders. Through 75 performances, 600 workshops, and over 40,000 children reached, the Flying Carpet Festival transforms war-torn lands into spaces of joy, resilience, and shared humanity.
Flying Carpet Festival Returns To Mardin And Beyond
The Flying Carpet Festival 2025 is set to return between August 30 - September 9, 2025, once again transforming the landscapes of Southeastern Türkiye into a stage of music, circus, dance, visual arts, and storytelling.
Founded by Iranian-American composer Sahba Aminikia and organized by the Art Anywhere Association (Sirkhane Social Circus School), the festival has become a beacon of joy and resilience for children and families in border communities. Now in its eighth year, Flying Carpet brings together over 50 international and local artists from across four continents to weave a tapestry of beauty, play, and hope in towns and villages along the Turkish-Syrian border.
The Greatest Show On Earth — For Kids Who Need It Most
TED Fellow and composer Sahba Aminikia brings the healing power of dance, storytelling, music and performance to some of the most dangerous places on Earth. By celebrating children and their communities with beauty and joy, he shows how to cultivate hope, connection and love — even in conflict zones. "The ultimate power is in unity," Aminikia says.
“Children have more imagination than we do”
Kulturaustausch - Circus and theatre for refugee children in the middle of a conflict-torn area? The Flying Carpet Festival on the Turkish-Syrian border makes the impossible possible
You are invited to the opening of the “Life Through My Eyes” exhibition in Mardin!
Hello Dear Readers,
With the cooperation of UNHCR Southeast Office and Art Anywhere Association and Sirkhane DARKROOM and the contributions of Welthungerhilfe (WHH), We will be happy to see you at the opening ceremony of the exhibition "Life Through My Eyes" consists of photographs taken by Turkish and refugee children living in Mardin, adding a piece of their imagination and life to every frame of them which will take place on 15th October 2022, Saturday at 13:30. Our exhibition will be open to visitors between 15-17 October between 09:00 and 17:00.
Photography project by Her Yerde Sanat and Sirkhane DARKROOM Supported by UNHCR Türkiye
With the support of @unhcrturkiye7575, Sirkhane DARKROOM continue travelling to the most distant places and given the opportunity to children to speak for themselves with Photography accompany with awareness workshops such as child right, gender equality and peer bullying.
E- Bülten - 2022 Mart
Her Yerde Sanat Derneği kuruluşundan bu yana çocuk güvenliği ve koruması alanında çalışma yürütmekte ve bu çalışmaları ihtiyaç durumu tespit edilmiş alanlara gezici eğitim ve destekler ile oluşturulan eğitim personeli ve eğitim destek ekipmanlarıyla temelini sirk katılımlı sosyal pedagojik etkinliklerden alan çalışmalar yapmaya devam etmektedir. HYSD çocukların yerel anlamdaki ihtiyaçlarına odaklanan çocuk koruma ve sosyal uyum süreçlerini pekiştirici bir çok alternatif eğitim yöntemi ile çocuk katılımlı bir anlayışıyla çalışmalarına devam etmektedir. Mart 2022’de Kızıltepe’de bulunan Gezici Sirkhane Mobil Eğitim Merkezi aktif olarak sahada akran katılımlı, eğlenceli tematik oyun temelli eğitimler, çocuk koruma çalışmaları ve vaka yönetimi yapmaktadır.
A Syrian Photographer’s Gift to Refugee Children
The New Yorker - After fleeing his native country for Turkey, Serbest Salih created a mobile darkroom and went on the road teaching kids to make pictures.
4. Sosyal İçerme Laboratuvarı 24-25 Şubat 2022 tarihlerinde Mardin’de gerçekleşti
SOIL PROJESİ HAKKINDA
Sosyal İçerme Laboratuvarı Projesi (SOIL), İsveç Enstitüsü Yaratıcı Güç Programı tarafından finanse edilmektedir.
E-Bülten - 2022 Ocak-Şubat
Her yerde Sanat Derneği olarak Mardin'in Kızıltepe ilçesinde sosyal uyum içerikli atölye çalışmalarımız uzun bir planlama aşamasından sonra ikinci saha çalışma deneyimimiz olarak 5 Ocak 2022 tarihiyle başladı. Her Yerde Sanat Derneği-Sirkhane olarak çocuklar için alan açma girişimleri ve saha çalışmaları heyecanımızın bizleri ulaştırdığı nokta kıvanç verici Pandemi koşullarında giriştiğimiz sahada atölye girişimimiz, bizleri dernek olarak daha doğru ve güçlü temellere dayanan anlayışımız, çocuklarla dernek olarak temasımızı güçlendirmekle beraber daha ileriye dönük yaklaşımlar geliştirmemizi sağladı. Şüphesiz ocak ayı itibariyle başladığımız, sahada atölye çalışmalarımızda proje ortaklarımızın ve dernek çalışanlarımızın katkıları çok büyüktür. Bizimle bu çalışmalara katılıp emek veren her kurum ve çalışanımıza ne kadar teşekkür etsek azdır. Herkese sonsuz teşekkürler.
Gezici Sirkhane Alanı Açılış Etkinliği
Her yerde Sanat Derneği Olarak Mardin'in Kızıltepe ilçesinde Bahçelievler bölgesinde sosyal uyum içerikli atölye çalışmalarımız uzun bir planlama aşamasından sonra 5 Ocak 2022 tarihiyle başlamıştı. Her yerde Sanat Derneği-Sirkhane olarak 24 şubat 2022' de Sirkhane-Kızıltepe Gezici etkinlik alanının açılışını yapacağız. Açılışta sizleri de aramız görmekten mutluluk duyarız.
These exuberantly free photos were made by children living along Turkey’s border with Iraq and Syria - the washington post
I Saw The Air Fly
Conscientious Photo Magazine - Every once in a while, photography produced outside the narrow confines of photoland manages to find its way inside, resulting in a breath of fresh air in an environment stultified by its own conventions and structures, in particular by its insistence on the model of the “master” photographer crafting precious images.
Young Refugees On The Syrian Border Were Given Cameras. This Is What They Saw.
CNN - With millions of refugees from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq fleeing their homes over the last decade, images of despair -- of people huddled on boats, of bodies washed ashore -- also migrated across newspaper front pages and down news feeds.
Artists Wow Children In Turkey With Lively Shows
Associated Press - In its third edition, the Flying Carpet Festival drew smiles on the faces of children from impoverished communities in southeast Turkey. The festival is a visual and musical spectacle performed by artists from around the world. With circus performances including acrobatics, juggling and stilt walking, organizers of the Flying Carpet Festival in Turkey always come prepared to entertain. In a recent event in the southeastern city of Mardin, performers regaled the children with a show featuring a giant puppet, followed by a music performance and tales told by a storyteller, among other segments.
A Traveling Darkroom On The Syria–Turkey Border Is Encouraging Children To Make Photos
Serbest Salih’s traveling darkroom is unlike almost any other in the world — a few miles over the Syrian border in Turkey, it moves on a trailer hitch like a caravan from town to town. The darkroom works primarily with children, most of them refugees like Salih himself.