Land and Seascapes by Pembe Plümer at the Ismet Güney Art Centre

By Heidi Trautmann

When the world was still in order….one would think, looking at Pembe Plümer’s paintings. Pembe Plümer, born in 1931in Larnaka, the oldest member of a well-known Cypriot family and grandmother to artist friend Dr. Esra Plümer, who not only curated her grandmother’s exhibition but recently also for the artists Gönen Atakol and Ismet Tatar (in the sequence of exhibitions).

After graduation from the Terra Santa French School in Larnaka and after the death of her father, Pembe (Muzzafer) went to Nicosia and did a one year course in dress making. She married Fazil Plümer in 1955 and had two children. At the onset of the 1963 inter-communal conflicts, she moved to Tanzimat Street (Arabahmet quarter). As from 1965 she attended handicrafts, ceramics and various other art courses at the Atatürk Vocational College. Over the years she took advantage of the workshop facilities provided by the college and developed her artistic skills. In addition to pottery, carpet weaving, decorative arts, copper work, textile, cross stitch and crochet, Pembe first took up oil painting as her interest in the arts grew and with time passing also water colours. Going through the halls of Ismet Güney Art Centre, I found her oldest painting exhibited to be from 1968 and the latest from 2011.

You feel transported into another era and into another Cyprus and Pembe Plümer discovered with her artistic eye the simplicity and beauty of it. She has reinterpreted photographs or pages of a calendar in her own way; there are no human figures, only their dwellings set in a calm and timeless landscape. She also loves the sea being born in Larnaka and so is the sea and its shores, the small lakes and rivers often the theme of her work.

She stood very upright and beautiful within the circle of family and friends, her eyes shining and she seems to still go strong and I can imagine that she still regularly retires into her studio to paint her peaceful land and seascapes, either watercolour or oil paintings. My best wishes go with her.

The exhibition is open until 03 July during governmental office hours.