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Can An Exhibition Change Your Life?

Can An Exhibition Change Your Life?

“ONE DAY I READ A BOOK AND IT CHANGED MY WHOLE LIFE.” SO BEGINS ORHAN PAMUK’S NOVEL, THE NEW LIFE. NOW WE ARE LOOKING AT AN EXHIBITION THAT WILL DO JUST THAT.

Four-hundred and thirty-three works by 20 artists from businessman Öner Kocabeyoğlu’s private collection are at Santralistanbul under the title, 20 Modern Turkish Artists of the 20th Century: 1940-2000. According to Ferit Edgü, who attributes the success of an exhibition to factors like its ability to make viewers stop and think, to leave them alone with the artists and works, and to arouse curiosity about the predilections of the collector who brought those works together, this is an eminently successful exhibition. Indeed, everyone should be prepared for their life to be changed.

This is not an exhibition organized chronologically by period or by theme. Instead it’s all down to the eye and heart of the collector. Öner Kocabeyoğlu, who started collecting years ago when a small gouache by Selim Turan changed his life, explains the purpose of his exhibition as follows: “What I wanted to do was to repay a debt of gratitude to our artists who brought happiness by opening the doors to a new world for me.” A rather simple and modest aim, especially when you consider that most of the artists in the exhibition held no shows during their lifetimes.

THE 20 ARTISTS
Fahrelnissa Zeid, Fikret Muallâ, Hakkı Anlı, Abidin Dino, Ferruh Başağa, Selim Turan, Avni Arbaş, Nejad Devrim, İlhan Koman, Mübin Orhon, Adnan Çoker, Burhan Doğançay, Ömer Uluç, Albert Bitran, Yüksel Arslan, Mehmet Güleryüz, Komet, Alaettin Aksoy, Ergin İnan,
Koray Ariş.