“Painting makes me feel free” Zihniye Yalçın, who expressed the pleasure she gets from painting, said that she puts her dreams on canvas and said, “I was living in Antalya and came to Ağrı. We live in Ağrı with my son now, while I was traveling, I saw Ağrı Public Education Center and I entered the painting course to see if they would accept me as a guest, I love painting very much. When I was 40, I got the urge to paint because my father was a calligrapher, when he became a calligrapher, I was wondering if we had talent or ability, at that time I talked to our teacher and he said maybe we accept and so on, then I came to the workshop, it is a very nice environment, I thank them very much for accepting me, I am having a great time here.

We create very beautiful paintings, a very nice atmosphere, we work with very nice young people. We have girls who are high school students, they are preparing for university and they want to study Fine Arts. I work with them and they motivate me and they create very beautiful paintings, I work with them and I become young with them, we have such a good time here, I feel very free when I am painting, let me say this first. I love painting very much, you produce something, you create something beautiful, you say this is my work, creating a work is a very nice thing, it is very exciting, combining colors together is a different pleasure, it motivates people, it relieves stress, I love painting very much and it makes you happy.”

“My children didn’t like it at first but I didn’t give up” Yalçın, who didn’t get much support from his family at first, continued with his determination and achieved beautiful works, saying, “First my children saw the pictures I made and said they were very funny. They said you don’t do it well at all, you better quit this job, but I never wanted to quit, my determination continued. I thought I was going and coming back with great love, I said I have to succeed, then I worked constantly, I wrote and drew, they did a lot too, then now, thank God, something is coming out, I think I did beautiful things.
 

My children also say, it's good that you didn't quit mom, you're doing great, they support me, encourage me, they say, it's great, sometimes they find it strange that I did these things at the age of 62, they say, you go, come, and deal with these things, they are surprised at this age, they say. Then, they congratulate me later, they look at me and I never give up on my determination. I usually hang up our paintings, my friends and relatives like some of them, they tell me to do them too, I give some as gifts so that it remains as a memory and my labor, I give them gifts too. My children love my paintings very much, now they hang them in their homes, they look at them with admiration, they say, how great you did, mom, my paintings hang in my children's homes, they hang in their own homes too. "
“I aim to open an exhibition” Zihniye Yalçın, who improved herself during the course, emphasized that she dreams of opening a personal exhibition and said, “Opening an exhibition is a big dream of mine, I am constantly working towards it and I am producing more to open an exhibition. In other words, it is the dream of every painter and every artist to open an exhibition and introduce them, it would be a source of pride for a person, I hope I also want to open an exhibition in the future, I would like to introduce and show them.”