THE AMERICAN RESEARCH INSTITUTE IN TURKEY

cordially invites you to attend a lecture

From Expo ’58 to Cyprus:  Bedri Rahmi’s

Lost Mosaic Wall

A Sidestreets Exhibition Preview by

Dr. Johann Pillai

The Director of cultural and educational programs

at Sidestreets (www.sidestreets.org)

Fifty years ago, one of the most important works in the history of modern Turkish art and architecture disappeared. This work was Turkey’s first modern, prefabricated building, the visionary Turkish pavilion, designed for Expo ’58, the Brussels World’s Fair by architects Utarit İzgi, Muhlis Türkmen, Hamdi Şensoy and İlhan Türegün. The pavilion brought together, in a collaborative synthesis of art and architecture, major figures in Turkish art, such as İlhan Koman, Sabri Berkel, Fureya Koral, and Zeki Faik İzer.

The recent discovery in North Cyprus of some of the most visually striking parts of Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu’s mosaic wall prompted a research project that has extended from Turkey to Europe to the United States to Cyprus, to trace for the first time, the full history of this lost artwork.  On 6 October 2010, Sidestreets, the only independent arts organization in Cyprus, will be opening its exhibition “From Expo ’58 to Cyprus: Bedri Rahmi’s Lost Mosaic Wall.” The exhibition will provide the first opportunity in 50 years for the public to view the surviving parts of this artwork in Cyprus, display for the first time a digital photographic reconstruction of the entire wall, and tell its untold story.  This lecture provides an overview of the research done for the exhibition, covering the architectural, artistic, and socio-political context of the lost work.

Thursday, Sept. 16, 2010 at 19:00

ARIT

Üvez Sok., No. 5

Arnavutköy 34345, Istanbul

Tel: 257 8111; Fax: 257 8369