Mahmut Celayir was born on May 1, 1951, in Bingöl, Turkey. He is a Kurdish-German painter known for his pastoral landscape paintings.

Born as the eldest of six children to mason Serif Celayir and his wife Kumey Sedxunun in the small mountain village of Kur, Celayir belongs to the Iranian ethnic group of the Zaza.

After attending primary and middle school from 1960 to 1968, he attended high school in Tunceli until 1971, graduating with his Abitur. At age twenty, in 1972, he began studies with a focus on printmaking at the Academy of Applied Arts in Istanbul.

In 1986 he came to Germany for the first time, where in Berlin he focused on landscape painting, which he had chosen as the center of his work. In 1988, Celayir relocated his life to Germany and settled in Stuttgart.

He continues his art studies in Istanbul and Berlin.