Art

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Sümer Erek to stage powerful live performance in Brussels in memory of murdered friend

  In 1977 Muharrem Özdemir was 19 and his friend just 18, both gifted Cypriot teenagers studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Istanbul when they were forcibly abducted and held captive for a day before being shot by Turkish fascists. Before his death, Muharrem’s friend had begun a portrait...

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Indulge your senses with this special night of live music and painting

  It’s not often an event promoter combines amazing live music with art in a historic setting and all for a good cause, but that’s exactly what consultant Zeynep Ober sets out to achieve with Painting Meets Music. While the event name lacks imagination, the evening’s contents certainly sparkle....

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Art: see Upright Animal and hear artist Selma Parlour talk about her first major London exhibition

Pi Artworks London’s latest exhibition showcases new work by emerging talent Selma Parlour. Called Upright Animal and curated by Sacha Craddock, it is the Johannesburg-born artist’s first major solo exhibition in Britain and features a series of large ‘human-size’ paintings that imitate and challeng...

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Sümer Erek’s new exhibition Mediterranean Days set to open in Dalston

Sümer Erek continues with his Mediterranean themed art with a new exhibition that opens in the heart of East London next week. In his latest collection, Erek, who is of Turkish Cypriot origin, pieces together Mediterranean culture. He starts by remarking a 'single sea shore'. To these he adds ele...

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From artistic ancestors to clueless descendants: Ottoman-obsessed hallucinations in New Turkey

Two weeks ago, an angry mob attacked an art exhibition at Istanbul’s Abdülmecid Efendi Pavilion. The building used to belong to the last Ottoman Caliph Abdülmecid. The exhibition, called Doors Open to Those Who Knock, showcased artwork owned by Turkish businessperson Ömer Koç. It opened to public...

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Former British ambassador and Iraqi artist share love of calligraphy in new Yunus Emre Institute exhibition

To mark its seventh birthday, the Yunus Emre Institute in London is presenting a new art exhibition – Art in Letters ­– ­at its Bloomsbury venue. It brings together the artistic works of Dr Ömer Kasim Kahya and Sir Terence Clark, two seemingly different men. One is from the East, the other from the...

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Art: minority experiences in Sticks and Stones – Fatma Bucak’s first solo London exhibition

  Pi Artworks is currently showcasing artist Fatma Bucak’s first solo exhibition in the UK – Sticks and Stones, curated by Nat Muller. The multi-disciplinary artist focuses on two of the most pertinent struggles of our times, namely freedom of expression and freedom of movement. Born in t...

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Gavin Turk, Damien Hirst collaborate for ‘Turkish Tulips’ exhibition at The Bowes Museum

The iconic tulip gets an artistic makeover by British conceptual artist Gavin Turk and friends in a new international touring exhibition commissioned by the Van Loon Museum in Amsterdam. The Bowes Museum in the north of England is the current stop for Turkish Tulips, which features works by Tur...

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Review: Fahrelnissa Zeid – the princess of abstract art

  First a daughter and a sister, then a wife, a mother, a princess and a painter externalising her talent… This major Tate Modern exhibition takes you into the world of a 20th century artist lost to history, whose life was as colourful as her art. Describing a self-portrait from 1980 Fahr...

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Fahrelnissa Zeid: Istanbul’s famed abstract artist gets solo retrospective at Tate Modern  

London’s leading contemporary art gallery is currently hosting the works of Turkish female artist Fahrelnissa Zeid. Frances Morris, director of Tate Modern, says this major exhibition is an opportunity to re-appraise the “huge, ornate, decorative, multifaceted, brilliantly coloured, swirling abstrac...

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