Fotoğrafın Türkiye'deki Sancılı Yolculuğu (≈Photography’s Troubled Journey in Turkey)

Refik Akyüz, Serdar Darendeliler

IstanbulArtNews, February 2015, Issue 17

 

"Following the closure of Elipsis Gallery in recent months, the only commercial gallery in Turkey dedicated exclusively to exhibiting photography, the idea of preparing a feature on the Turkish photography market—an idea that had long been on IAN’s agenda—came back to the fore.

Although photography in Turkey has a long history and there are many individually successful practitioners working in the field, it still struggles to stand firmly on its own feet because of shortcomings in areas such as institutionalization, education, publishing, criticism, and audience development. The negative experiences surrounding photography’s position within the art market—at least those frequently voiced in encounters among actors in the photography world—should not be dismissed either.

Given this situation, we wanted to start with questions such as “Why has a genuine photography market still failed to emerge in Turkey?”, “Why do local institutions, galleries, and collectors remain hesitant about editioned works and a medium such as photography, which can hardly be considered new anymore?”, and “Why do we still not have an established photography collection?” Our aim was both to offer a general assessment and to take a snapshot of the Turkish photography market through the perspectives of artists, galleries, collectors, and various institutions."

(Translation of excerpt from the article)

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[Click here to view and download the full article in Turkish as the original PDF.]