TÜRKIYE BLUES

Istanbul Fotograf Galerisi

Ilknur Can, Dinçer Dökümcü, Timurtaş Onan, Erhan Şermet, Tuncer Tunç, Cem Turgay

This group exhibition presents six photographers of the Istanbul Fotograf Galerisi for the first time in Berlin. On view are a society’s interiors and major changes, a metropolis undergoing transformation in poetic documentary images.
Timurtaş Onan has been portraying life in Istanbul in his black-and-white photographs for over thirty years: his is a world of transitions and contrasts. Erhan Şermet depicts the course of gentrification and the changes it brings in the metropolis; classic portrait shots alternate with city views. Ilknur Can sets aside the camera in favor of her iPhone in a way that makes the distance between photographer and subject seem to disappear—in their directness, her images are reminiscent of private family photos. In his images, Dinçer Dökümcü creates visibility for minority groups in Istanbul: refugees in the niches of urban space. Cem Turgay and Tuncer Tunç collaborate frequently and their photographs tell the stories beyond the visible: murky, mystical, unsettling, and provocative.