Basak Senova is a curator and designer. Since 2017, she has been living and working in Vienna. Senova studied Literature and Graphic Design (MFA in Graphic Design and PhD in Art, Design, and Architecture at Bilkent University) and attended the 7th Curatorial Training Programme of Stichting De Appel, Amsterdam. As an assistant professor, she lectured at various universities in Turkey. In 2017, she received her Associate Professorship from the Higher Education Council of Turkey and a resident fellowship at the University of the Arts, Helsinki, in co-operation with HIAP. From 2020 to 2022, she was a Visiting Professor at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, running a research-based educational platform, the Octopus Programme. Currently, she holds a Senior Postdoctoral Researcher position at the University of Applied Arts Vienna.

Senova has been writing on art, technology, and media, initiating and developing projects and curating exhibitions since 1995. She is one of the founding members of NOMAD, as well as the organiser of the “ctrl_alt_del” sound art project and “Upgrade!Istanbul”. She was the editor of art-ist 6, Kontrol Online Magazine, Lapses book series, UNCOVERED, Aftermath, Obje’ct: Yane Calovski, The Move, The Translation, Scientific Inquiries, Cultural Massacre, Ahmet Elhan—Ground Glass, Lines of Passage (in medias res), The Discord:Benji Boyadgian, Shadow Optics, CrossSections: Processing Artistic and Curatorial Research, Silent Activism. Barbara Holub and The Octopus, among other publications. Senova worked as the editorial correspondent of ibraaz.org (2012-2016), a member of the editorial board of PASS, the International Biennial Association’s (IBA) journal (2016-2023), and the Turkish correspondent of Flash Art International (2014-2023). Senova acted as an advisory board member of the Turkish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, the Istanbul Biennial, and the Biennial of Contemporary Art, D-0 ARK Underground in Bosnia and Herzegovina. She curated the Zorlu Center Collection for two years (2011-2012) while also acting as the editor of its publications.

Senova was the curator of the Pavilion of Turkey at the 53rd Venice Biennale. She co-curated the UNCOVERED  project (Cyprus, 2011-2013); and the 2nd and 5th Biennial of Contemporary Art, D-O ARK Underground (Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2013 and 2019). She acted as the Art Gallery Chair of (ACM) SIGGRAPH 2014 (Vancouver), the curator of the Helsinki Photography Biennial 2014, and the Jerusalem Show VII: Fractures (2014). In 2015, she curated the Pavilion of North Macedonia at the 56th Venice Biennale; in 2016, Lines of Passage (in medias res) Exhibition in Lesvos; and in 2019, the inaugural exhibition of B7L9, Climbing Through the Tide in Tunis. Between 2017 and 2019, she worked on CrossSections, a research/process-based art project, and curated five group exhibitions and three solo exhibitions within the project’s context in Vienna, Helsinki, Stockholm, and Rome in 2018 and 2019. In 2022, she concluded the Octopus Programme with two exhibitions that took place in Tunis and Vienna. In 2022, she curated three group exhibitions: Ivy (Istanbul), Liquid Saturation (Palermo), and 2Fold (Kyrenia); in 2023, she was invited to curate a design project for Kunsthaus Dahlem Berlin in the context of Erich Buchholz’s exhibition, curated by Dorothea Shöne; and curated a group exhibition Simurgh. Ten Women Artists from Iran (Berlin). In 2022, she concluded the Octopus Programme with two exhibitions, one in Tunis and the other in Vienna. In the same year, she curated three group exhibitions: Ivy (Istanbul), Liquid Saturation (Palermo), and 2Fold (Kyrenia). In 2023, she was invited to curate a design project for Kunsthaus Dahlem Berlin in conjunction with Erich Buchholz’s exhibition, and she curated the group exhibition Simurgh. Ten Women Artists from Iran (Berlin). In 2024 and 2025, her recent curatorial projects included Sediment (co-curated with Dicle Bestas) at <rotor> Galerie in Graz; Insaturo, a site-specific performance by Egle Oddo and Rebecca Minten at the Botanical Garden of the University of Vienna; Intangible, an exhibition by The ZoNE at Rauminhalt, The Atlas at Kunsthalle Exnergasse, Vienna and Mirror at Teatro Pirandello, Agrigento, the Italian Capital of Culture for 2025. In 2022, her Arts-based Research (PEEK) project, Atlas (of Creative Mechanisms): [CuratingConducting], was awarded by FWF–Austrian Science Fund (2022-2027).