Three cultural figures — Osman Kavala, Li Yuan and David Van Reybrouck — were awarded the 2025 Goethe Medal by the Goethe Institute for outstanding services to international cultural exchange. The award ceremony will take place in Weimar on August 28, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's birthday. Osman Kavala remains imprisoned after his 2017 arrest on charges of seeking to overthrow the government and faces a life sentence. In 2022 he founded Anadolu Kultur to link arts, civil society and human rights and co-founded the Association for the Protection of Cultural Heritage. He promoted projects like the Armenia-Turkey Cinema Platform and the Turkey-Armenia Youth Symphony Orchestra and stated that art collaboration can overcome prejudices and foster mutual understanding.
Imprisoned Turkish cultural promoter and social justice activist, Osman Kavala, along with Chinese scholar and German language expert Li Yuan and the Belgian archaeologist and author David Van Reybrouck, have been awarded the 2025 Goethe Medal. Whether they're breaking down cultural barriers, fighting for human rights and democracy or finding a common language, the trio have been honored by Germany's global cultural body, the Goethe Institute, for their outstanding services to international cultural exchange.
In 2022, the philanthropist and human rights defender founded the Turkish NGO, Anadolu Kultur, which works at the intersection of arts and culture, civil society and human rights advocacy and supports diverse projects in often marginalized regions. Kavala also co-founded the Association for the Protection of Cultural Heritage, which is working to preserve culturally significant sites and artifacts. And through initiatives such as the Armenia-Turkey Cinema Platform and the Turkey-Armenia Youth Symphony Orchestra, Kavala has decisively promoted cross-border cultural exchange.
Collection
[
|
...
]