Professor Doctor Tankut Öktem (b. 1940 in Konya - d. 5 December 2007 in İstanbul) was a Turkish sculptor famous in Turkey especially for his monumental works.
He was born in Konya in 1940 and his childhood was spent moving from one location in Turkey to another following the successive assignments of his parents who were veterinaries employed within the state. By his teens, he was already recognized as a child prodigy in sculpture and painting and he concentrated on the former discipline after his enrollment in the ceramics branch of İstanbul Fine Arts School. While at the third grade of the school, he received the first prize in a World Contest for Young Sculptors. He completed his education in Germany at Porzellanfabrik Schönwald in 1962.
He became an assistant in 1965 and pursued an arts teacher's career in the same institution where he had done his studies and which became a faculty of Marmara University in 1983.
He made himself well-known in Turkey after the 1970s especially with monumental works which had Atatürk or the Turkish War of Independence as theme and which are remarkable especially with their high number of figurines. In 1999, he was accorded the title State Artist by the Turkish government.
Professor Tankut Öktem died on 5 December 2007 in a traffic accident in İstanbul.