IMAGE DETAILS

'The Halchiu Diamonds in Compartments Rug', probably Bergama region, west Anatolia, 15th century. 1.30 x 1.87m, wool pile on a wool foundation. Evangelical Church, Halchiu (Heldsdorf)

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Monday, April 02, 2007

Beginning on 19 April 2007 and timed to coincide with ICOC XI, but not part of the ‘official’ programme, are two exhibitions curated by Michael Franses, in co-operation with Nazan Ölçer, the proactive Director of the Sakip Sabanci Museum in Emirgan.

The first and more important of these exhibits is ‘Anatolian Rugs in the Churches of Transylvania, 1500-1750’, a much expanded reprise of the exhibition hosted by the Islamic Art Museum in Berlin last October.

The beauty of Turkish rugs appealed so greatly to generations of people in the Transylvanian region of Romania that they cherished and displayed hundreds of them in their churches for at least five centuries. From the 15th century onwards, trade in Transylvania relied heavily on the Ottomans and up to the early 18th century there was a great demand in Europe for of certain types of Ottoman Turkish rugs, mainly from the provinces of Ushak and Manisa in western Anatolia, as can be seen from the numerous depictions of carpets in European paintings. Almost certainly woven by Muslims, such old rugs were nevertheless treasured outside the Islamic world. They represent a significant part of Turkish art history that would otherwise have been lost, as very few similar examples survive in Turkey.

Examples showing the range of patterns displayed by these rugs have been selected for the Istanbul exhibition from the church and museum holdings in Romania, supplemented by further examples once in the churches and now in Hungarian collections, as well as a small group from Berlin that show how similar patterns seen on west Anatolian rugs were adopted in Egypt both before and after the Ottoman conquest in 1517.

This exhibition of 41 antique Anatolian rugs at the Sabanci Museum has been organised in co-operation with the National Brukenthal Museum in Sibiu, the Evangelical Church A.C. of Romania, the Romanian Ministry of Culture and Cults, the National Museum of Art in Bucharest, the Hungarian National Museum, the Museum of Applied Arts in Budapest and the Museum of Islamic Art in Berlin.

The second Sabanci Museum exhibition consists of 47 Kaitag embroideries from Daghestan in the mountainous northeastern region of the Transcaucasus, once flanked by the Russian, Ottoman and Iranian empires.  The display comprises the remarkable collection published in 1993 in Robert Chenciner's Kaitag, Textile Art of Daghestan, which effectively brought Kaitag textiles to the attention of the world.

The art of Kaitag embroideries survives in fewer than a thousand examples, arguably dating from the 16th century (under Ottoman influence) through to the 19th, mostly now in collections throughout the world. The Kaitag embroiderers were blessed with a special artistry and inspiration, linked in part to their awareness of the international silk and textile trade that passed through nearby Derbent on the silk route along the Caspian Sea, bringing a greater volume of different styles and approaches than could have been seen by artisans working in other materials. The vast repertoire of bold designs – from such a small region – that give Kaitag textiles their beauty and fascination is partly a result of the history of the region, through which so many different conquerors have passed during the previous two thousand years, and partly the inspiration of the local artists. Since its first publication this collection has been exhibited in France, Sweden. and Germany, while other partial exhibitions have been held in the USA and Australia. Now this material is to be seen for the first time in Turkey.

For more information please see:

http://muze.sabanciuniv.edu/english/sergiler/gelecek.php or http://www.textile-art.com/istanbul07.html