7 turkish artists @ photographic resource center
7 Turkish Artists: Mike Mandel & Chantal Zakari
September 13 – November 12, 2011
Panel Discussion: Thursday, October 27, 2011, 6:30 pm
BU College of Arts & Sciences Room 522, 725 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston
© Mike Mandel & Chantal Zakari
7 Turkish Artists engages the social themes that define contemporary Turkey, specifically examining the imagery of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, its revolutionary leader after World War I. This show provides a critical visual exploration on the meaning of Atatürk’s imagery and how it is used in Turkish society today. Between 1997 and 2010, artists Zakari and Mandel, one Turkish, one American, chronicle their experiences photographing people, secular and Western, or religious and conservative in appearance. They conducted interviews and collected found material from archives, gathering popular historical illustrations and found Atatürk postcards that span a thirty year period and illustrate the cult status of his image. The artists’ recent book, The State of Ata, seeks to recognize the complex relationship in Turkey between secularists, the Islamist movement and military power.
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