Ankara Araştırmaları Dergisi (Jul 2022)
Exhibition Spaces and Galleries in Ankara from 1950 to 2000
Abstract
Ankara, the capital city in which the foundations of the republican ideology were laid, has exhibited the cultural identity of the contemporary Turkey through many artistic and other cultural events. Although there was reduced support for arts and culture during the multi-party period in 1946, artistic activities continued through the work of non-governmental organizations and individuals. A number of periodical publications, an analysis of personal archives of Ankara artists, and the study of oral history with gallery exhibitors, are all used in this study to identify the places in which exhibition activities were held between the years of 1950-2000. A total of 272 exhibition spaces and galleries in Ankara are considered in the study. There are 75 exhibition spaces and galleries which opened before 2000 and are still in operation. 15 of these operate as private galleries, while others are under the ownership of educational inceleninstitutions, banks, foreign cultural centers, official institutions, museums, embassies, hotels, cultural centers of municipalities and other organizations. As a result of the decrease in state support since the 1950s, the number of galleries has increased due to the initiatives gaining momentum in the 1970s, as well as the political developments and liberal economic policies of the 1980s. As artistic support and records of the formation of artistic bodies, rather than the announcing of artistic productions, only began in the 1990s, this study serves as a comprehensive reminder of the exhibition spaces and galleries whose traces have been erased from the cultural and artistic memory of Ankara.
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