EVENTS

Thoughts after “Mimar Kemalettin and His Era” Symposium / Ali Cengizkan

Organized by The Chamber of Architects of Turkey as part of the 10th Cycle of Architecture Awards, the Commemoration Programme aimed to enliven the memories and architecture of a late architect, Mimar Kemalettin and his era. As a result of 2 years of research of the committee members a large bulk of information on the architect was collected. These information was shared with the society in a two days symposium, where the architect and his era were discussed and the opening of an exhibition, which covers a rich selection of his works. “Mimar Kemalettin and His Era: Architecture, Social Life and Politics” Symposium attracted worthy contributions from various academics and was held in one of the late buildings of Kemalettin in Gazi University. Ali Cengizkan, who was responsible from the organization of the symposium summarizes the event, the different approaches that enriched the symposium as well as the discussions engendered.

Exploring “Other Modernisms” from the Early Republican Turkey / Kıvanç Kılınç, Tonguç Akış

Due to the lack of comparative studies in literature on modern architecture in Turkey, the architectural schools have started to give more emphasis on these topics. Architectural History Studio organized by Architectural History Graduate Programme in METU, is a significant attempt in grounding a discussion platform on the subject. The studio set subject to the early 20th century modern architecture as experienced in Turkey, Russia and Holland from different perspectives. The authors evaluate and summarise the presentations of the event.

REFLECTIONS

The theme of the file edited by Emel Kayın, in the previous 338th issue of the magazine was “A New Approach to the Field of Conservation-Preservation”. The editorial article of Kayın in the file focused on some of the issues in the field of conservation and preservation and their relations with modernity and its constitutions. In this section we compile the critical approach of Güngör Kaftancı to the article of Kayın and Kayın’s answer to this criticism. In the first article Kaftancı reflects on some issues and notions that Kayın uses in her previous article. For Kaftancı, Kayın mentions a certain dialectic relationship between ‘modernity’ and ‘preservation paradigms’ and that becomes a misleading approach especially in Turkish case. Upon these criticisms the following article of Kayın tries to answer these criticisms through detailing some of the terms and the arguments that were used in her previous article.

ARCHITECTURE OF THE REPUBLICAN PERIOD

After the DOCOMOMO_Kayseri Meeting: Notes on the 20th Century ‘Modern’ Architectural Heritage / Burak Asiliskender

Having set its major aim as the documentation and preservation of 20th century modern architecture, Docomomo –TR National Work Group has started to organise a series of events under the theme “Local Modernisms in Turkish Architecture” starting from 2004. The third of these series, which aim to reveal specific Turkish cases as well as the adventures of modern architecture in this geography, had taken place between November, 2nd- 4th in Kayseri. As the author argues, the meeting provided great opportunity for sharing interesting examples in the preservation of modern architecture and the great variety in the paper and poster presentations, offered a chance to create a consciousness towards our undocumented modern architectural heritage.
 
AGENDA
AKP Headquarters, Some Problems and Bülent Ecevit / Orhan Şahinler
The Headquarters of AKP (Justice and Development Party) was opened in June 2007 in Ankara. The building, except the accidents that took place during its construction or changes made over the original master plan by the Metropolitan Municipality, rarely discussed in architectural realms. It could be argued that the building got erected rather quickly and in a secretive manner. Şahinler argues that behind the façade of this political party headquarters, realized by the help of public sources, lies an architectural image that constantly promotes conservatism at national level.
 
FILE: “Continuity and Change” in Architecture and Education
“Architecture and Education Assembly” is an event organized by the Chamber of Architects, Turkey in every two years in order to form a significant discussion platform with academic contributions to the problems of the architectural practice and architectural education. The fourth meeting took place in METU Architecture Department under the theme “Architecture and Education / Continuity and Change” between November, 7th and 9th 2007. Bearing the same theme with the Assembly, the file covers the presentations and discussions that are of major relevance with the general argument.
 
The first two articles one being the article of Bülend Tuna, the President of the Chamber, and the latter Haluk Pamir, the President of the Assembly, review the preparation process of the Assembly, the issues that came forward in to the agenda and how the Assembly approached to these issues. While Tuna questions the role of the architect in the building process, Pamir mentions the significance of certain issues in the architectural education and a need for an autonomous design institute for dealing with these issues. Nur Esin summarizes the presentations of the Assembly that were directly related with architectural education in her article “After the Assembly: On Architectural Education Sessions”. Among the international contributions to the Assembly, Architects Council of Europe (ACE) Senior Adviser Adrian Joyce focused on the legislative changes in the architectural practice and education with respect to EU regulations. He also mentioned the attitude of ACE in the face of these forthcoming changes. The second international contribution was Jack Pringle, the Past President of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), who summarized the validation and accreditation procedures that are employed by RIBA. He also outlined the proposals for an international accreditation system between RIBA and UIA. The following article “On Architectural Discipline in Practice” belongs to the editor of the Journal of Architectural Education (JAE) George Dodds, where he comments on how architectural journals reflect to the ongoing changes within the architectural discipline.
 
The final session in the Assembly focused on the relationship between architecture-architects and society. The final article “Society and Architecture” belongs to the first speaker of the final session, İlhan Tekeli, where the main argument rests on his hypothesis that urban planning prevents the private sector to destroy itself.
 
COMPETITION
Eskişehir Chamber of Commerce Service Building Architecture Competition
Organized by the Eskişehir, Chamber of Commerce, the two staged architectural competition aimed to achieve plans for a building complex that would shelter service building, exhibition space, congress space, recreational and social facility spaces. Moving from the fact that the current service building is insufficient in the face of contemporary needs of the chamber, the competition sought for a new project, which will increase the quality of the service, meet the social needs of the members while providing them a space to gather together. All the projects pass the first round and the jury decided to give 3 awards and 10 purchase awards in the final stage of the competition. The winning project of Alişan Çırakoğlu and Oral Göktaş, and the way they arrange a diversity of activity spaces under a shell structure was found very impressive by the jury. The other awards were given to the project of Recep Üstün - Berna Üstün- Coşkun Üreyen and Tan Kamil Gürer - Ezgi Tuncer.
 
ARCHITECTURAL CRITICISM: The Discourse and Architecture of Turgut Cansever
The third time winner of the Aga Khan Architecture Prize, Turgut Cansever was re-brought into the architectural agenda very recently with a series of exhibitions and a publication. The couplet exhibition “Turgut Cansever: A Thinking Man and an Architect”, curated by Uğur Tanyeli and Atilla Yücel, was open to public view from April to August in two separate galleries in Istanbul. Added to that, the archival material that was used in the exhibitions as well as a long interview with the architect was gathered in a publication. Upon this already formed research ground we collected a series of articles, which look at the architect from different perspectives and focus on his thinking and building sides through different examples. In these series first article of Halil İbrahim Düzenli, “The Thoughts and Architecture of an Architect: On the Book of Turgut Cansever” puts forward a review to the recently published retrospective book. In the second article Gürhan Tümer re-draws a profile of the architect through his thoughts and discourse. Finally Numan Cebeci, in his article “Second Excitement on the Hills of Taurus Mountains” looks through the build work of the architect by means of his personal experiences and memories.
 
ARCHITECTURAL POLICIES
Building an Environment for the Social Cohesion:
Territorial Policies and Architecture in the European Forum for Architectural Policies / Tuğçe Selin Tağmat
European Forum for Architectural Policies Conference, hosted twice a year by each EU Term Presidency, took place in Matosinhos, Portugal in October 11th-12th, 2007. The theme of the conference was “Architecture in its Territorial Settlement: Building an Environment for the Social Cohesion” and administrative meetings took place as parallel events to the conference. Tuğçe Selin Tağmat, who attended to the event in the name of the Chamber of Architects of Turkey, which is full-member of the Forum since October 2006, summarizes the discussions that took place in the conference.
 
BOOK REVIEW
A Review on “The Actors of Architecture, Turkey 1900-2000” / Serpil Özaloğlu
Written by Uğur Tanyeli, “The Actors of Architecture, Turkey 1900-2000” differs from architectural history books that base on a traditional hierarchic structure. It neither tries to detail a history of a period basing on its assumed validity. Tanyeli bases his research on the autobiographies of the actors and re-writes the micro history of a period starting from the late Ottoman Empire to today. Serpil Özaloğlu presents a detailed review to the content of the book underlining that different historiographies instead of excluding each other they complement in the way that one doesn’t mention the absolute rights or wrongs.
 
MEA ARCHITECTURA MEA CULPA
One thousand one Ayasofya / Gürhan Tümer
When one names Ayasofya, people always recall the same well known Ayasofya in Istanbul. However there are many other buildings named Ayasofya not only in many other cities of the country but also in Istanbul. Tümer reminds us the other ‘Ayasofya’s.