Istanbul’s Troublesome Art Scene

First time visitors to Istanbul may search the ancient city’s Grand Bazaar for quintessentially Turkish souvenirs, be they hand-painted plates, ebru paintings or colourfully woven carpets. While the sprawling metropolis can deliver mementos like these, amidst the city's shops and culturally rich heritage, there’s a local art scene struggling to define itself.

“Istanbul is not Turkey at all,” says Ali Can Meydan, a Turkish artist who lived in Istanbul from 2008 to 2012. “The city is like a flood, which catches you and keeps you in its chaos. Most artists lose their identity when they come here.”

Once home to the great Roman and Ottoman empires, in 2010 Istanbul was named the European Capital of Culture. The honor highlights the city’s historic architecture, like the Hagia Sophia, originally constructed as a Byzantine basilica but now a museum, and its contemporary art collections found in galleries like Istanbul Modern.

As a city that stretches over two continents and contains a myriad of cultural influences both past and present, Istanbul might easily be considered a hub for artistic inspiration. But Meydan, who now lives in Ankara, isn’t so sure. He explains that a lack of locals in Turkey’s most populous city, where transient residents tend to come from elsewhere, makes Istanbul an impossible “bird nest” for artists.

“Istanbul is a grand bazaar,” he says. “It’s a good place to sell your stuff, not to create.”

Yet among the overabundance of galleries found in districts like Beyoğlu and Karakoy, local artists are looking for opportunities. One of them is Gözde Kırksekiz, a Turkish multimedia artist who has been living in Istanbul for eight years.

“Living in Istanbul, there’s the advantage of meeting interdisciplinary artists and discovering different medias,” Kırksekiz tells The Creators Project. “There are many talented artists and many galleries, but it’s very hard to find a place for your artwork. They have their own artists already, and sometimes, even posing a question to them can be intimidating.”

For a city that’s undergone continuous change since its foundation, Istanbul’s contemporary art scene is relatively new. Since the early 2000s, an explosion of museums and privately funded galleries have sought to redefine present-day Turkey, alongside a plethora of independent art initiatives.

“We can feel that people here are starting to have habits like going to an exhibit and trying to understand what art is or the idea behind artworks,” says Kırksekiz of the current art landscape. “But now most of the initiatives have shut down because of funding and other problems. Initiatives are very important for the artists and the community.”

Istanbul’s system of private art funding is marked by a lack of support from the state and has faced criticism for shaping artwork with a largely commercial influence. Unaffordable rent prices and recent political instability have made autonomous art projects few and far between. However, since 2011, one exhibition space in particular has bucked this trend.

“We wanted to create an initiative where there’s no funding or support from the big names and big companies,” says Sezgi Abalı and İpek Çankaya, founders of the Halka Art Project, an independent structure of exhibitions, talks and workshops funded through an international residency program.

“The residency runs this space so that local group exhibitions can be done here,” they say. “We can offer a place for non-gallery artists, art students, emerging artists and so on.”

Abalı and Çankaya met while studying arts management at Istanbul’s Yeditepe University, where according to them, students had “many ideas but no places to produce and exhibit.” The residency’s independent structure provides collaboration with foreign artists and allows for exhibits—including politically charged ones—that would have difficulty being shown elsewhere.

“Nowadays you cannot even talk about the political situation,” Abalı and Çankaya tell The Creators Project. “So there aren’t many exhibitions where you can act politically.”

The October bombings in Ankara, an influx of Syrian refugees and a rise in anti-government protests are just a few of the issues facing Turkey and its citizens—issues that should give voice to a vibrant art community.

“It should cause more production but people are in a catatonic mood I guess, ourselves as well,” says Abalı and Çankaya. “The main problem is that people cannot produce. That’s what we hear all the time when we talk to the artists."

In the coming months, Halka will put on Atlas of the Sleepless, an exhibition designed to comment on comatose states during times of instability. To learn more about the Halka Art Project’s residency programme and exhibit space click here.

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