Paranormal Artist Profile: Merve Akdeniz

We love a good dinosaur, and this scaly monster is a great one. (Merve Akdeniz) — We love a good dinosaur, and this scaly monster is a great one. *(Merve Akdeniz)*

Merve Akdeniz is a 25-year-old Turkish woman born and raised in Frankfurt Germany. She was fed a steady diet of horror movies and monsters growing up, which developed into a passion for sculpting her favorite creatures out of polymer clay.

"I love to work with polymer clay cause it is so easy to shape, detail, and it never dries," Merve said. "The reason why I love to sculpt monsters is because I am a huge horror movie and monster fan, and I love to watch every new horror movie released at least twice with my father."

"At the moment [my style] is rather cartoony, though I am going to change that to be more realistic or else no one will be scared of my monsters!" she added.

Merve credits her father with helping to foster her love of folklore and the paranormal.

"Together we like to read about legends of haunted houses, weird encounters, cryptids, etc," she said. "My very first book was about old legends and tales about werewolves, and since then I’ve loved the dark and unknown!"

Any artist who sculpts a couple of Fresno Nightcrawlers is going to earn our admiration.

While she hasn’t had any paranormal experiences herself, Merve is very interested in "everything related to ghosts and cryptids."

"I would say my favorite could be the legend of the Beast of Gevaudan, but I just can’t tell which ghost story is my favorite," she said. "I love pretty much every story about the paranormal."

That’s certainly something we can understand.

Merve advises other aspiring artists to not be overly critical of their work, and told us her plans for the future are to "grow as an artist and spread the love for big scary creatures!"

This talented young German Turk can be found on every social media site that we’ve ever heard of, so make sure to follow Merve wherever you find yourself on the internet. Visit her page in our art portal to find links to all of the ways to follow her, as well as her Etsy shop, which features an enticing selection of her marvelously monstrous sculptures.

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