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Saving Lady Mary

Important NPG portrait needs conserving

By Cornucopia UK | February 17, 2018


The National Portrait Gallery in London is trying to raise £6,900 to conserve an important painting of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, the eighteenth-century poet and author of Travels in Turkey, which inspired many European writers and artists, such as Ingres, not least for her description of her experiences of a...
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Digital art makes some Noise

From projections to GIFs, this exhibition elevates innovative art

By Cornucopia UK | February 14, 2018


On one of these grey Istanbul winter days, I took the metro way out to Maslak to chase a rumour about a particularly bright and exciting exhibition. Spiraling two floors down in Orjin Maslak and turning a sharp corner, I entered a large white room that flickered and flashed with...
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Kadıköy’s forgotten wonder

The Kadıköy Cinema

By Monica Fritz | February 11, 2018


Slightly down the street from The Süreyya Opera house, hidden away in a pasaj cluttered with gaudy shops, is the wonderful Kadikoy Cinema, built in 1967 and in store for some unknown changes. This week you can still see Fatih Akın's latest film, In the Fade, and enjoy the cinema,...
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St Stephens on the Golden Horn

Monica’s meanderings

By Monica Fritz | February 3, 2018


The once rusting St Stephen of the Bulgars in Balat has opened its doors again after years of silence and then restoration. This extraordinary structure now gleams from tip to toe, with the Fener/Balat weekend crowds of local tourists pouring in. The church was made of cast iron in Vienna,...
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X is for…

A memorable London must-see

By Cornucopia UK | February 3, 2018


The mid-19th century Alphabet of London includes this entry, and shows the importance of the British Museum's collection from the Lycian city of Xanthos.  Elgin's marbles don't get a mention. This comes from the Bishopsgate Institute in London. Xanthos features in Barnaby Rogerson and Rose Baring's article on the Lycean...
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All the fun of the fair

A cornucopia at The London Antique Rug & Textile Art Fair

By Cornucopia UK | January 25, 2018


The Decorative Antiques and Textiles Winter Fair in London’s Battersea Park is in full swing, with 150 exhibitors putting a huge variety of items on display. In the upstairs mezzanine the gloriously colourful world of LARTA, the London Antique Rug & Textile Fair, spreads out its wares. Pictured here is...
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Baroque on the Bosphorus

A Sunday afternoon at the splendid Hekimbaşı Salih Efendi Yalı

By Cornucopia UK | January 17, 2018


Hekimbaşı Salih Efendi Yalı perches like a queen’s ruby underneath the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge, the object of envy for casual boaters who dream of residing in summer mansions. From the back, it hides behind the stone wall that rims the main seaside road past Anadolu Hisarı. With the clouds...
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Princes Islands’ most endangered building

Europa Nostra puts the Greek Orphanage on a short list

By Cornucopia UK | January 17, 2018


The Greek Orphanage on Büyükada, formerly Prinkipo, largest of the Princes Islands, is one of 12 heritage sites shortlisted for the ‘7 Most Endangered’ programme for 2018, just announced by Europa Nova, at the start of the new European Year of Cultural Heritage. The story of the Greek Orphanage, built...
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Weekend gallery guide: Unexpected Textures

The tactile exhibitions taking over Karaköy

By Cornucopia UK | January 12, 2018


The new space housing four galleries (with one more across the way) in Karaköy allows the terrific experience of a different artistic thrill on every floor. I was struck by how many of these exhibitions don’t seem to translate to photographs; the textures and intricacies are best experienced up close....
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Antiques (and not quite): the Üsküdar flea market

Monica's meanderings (cont.)

By Monica Fritz | December 10, 2017


Uskudar's flea market is one, or maybe even the last, of the bazaars in Istanbul where a bargain is still to be found. On a Saturday afternoon the empty shops and busier workshops have a sleepy atmosphere – a shopkeeper actually remembered me from when I bought my first furniture...
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Feeling Right at Home in Salon

A Day at One of Istanbul’s Hottest Venues

By Ezgi Üstündağ | December 4, 2017


When I walked into Salon IKSV on November 10, ceramic mug and notebook in hand, it was the first time I’d ever seen it empty. The brightly-lit room–a dark grey floor connecting the small stage on one end to the sound booth and bar stocked on the other, with stairs...
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Turning an old leaf at sad, abandoned Haydarpaşa Station

The Haydarpaşa old books festival

By Monica Fritz | December 3, 2017


Today, December 3, is the last day of the Haydarpasa Sahaf Festival, an alternative way to browse second-hand books on the first track of the semi-abandoned, mythical train station jutting out into the Bosphorus that once served travellers to far-off destinations across Asia from Baghdad to Tehran. You can still...
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Weekend gallery guide: Odysseys and Oracles

Ai Weiwei's provocative porcelain works

By Cornucopia UK | November 23, 2017


The Biennial has wrapped up but there’s still plenty of art to see in the city. If you were too busy exploring Biennial events to see some of the other notable exhibits, now is your chance. Ai Weiwei On Porcelain at Sakıp Sabancı Museum, Emirgan The Chinese artist and provocateur...
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A Living Tribute

10th Annual Nâzım Hikmet Poetry Competition Accepting Submissions through January 15, 2018

By Ezgi Üstündağ | November 13, 2017


Poets around the world are invited to submit their original work to the 10 th annual Nâzım Hikmet Poetry Competition. The competition, judged by award-winning academics, poets and translators, will remain open until January 15, 2018. Aside from a monetary award of $100, competition winners and honorable mentions will be invited to read...
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Wish you were here

Monica’s meanderings

By Cornucopia | November 11, 2017


A beautiful Golden Horn morning view from a hidden-away student cafe called Mimar Sinan Cafe on a side street off of the Süleymaniye Mosque. The spectacle unfolds four storeys up a dark and kitsch stairwell. Photograph: Monica Fritz (part 3 of her series of Sunday postcards)
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Autumn sunset

Monica’s meanderings

By Cornucopia | November 5, 2017


Moda, October 15, 2017 Istanbul loves a good sunset. Monica Fritz, Cornucopia’s photographer-at-large, captures the dying day in Moda on the Asian side of the Bosphorus. Sharpshooters, lovers, smart phones and fishermen gather on the shore of the Sea of Marmara to share the moment.   Café life in the...
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Nelson’s Ottoman decoration goes on show

The sultan’s glittering gift has been re-created

By Cornucopia UK | October 30, 2017


Was it Horatio or his chelengk that attracted Emma? In the 1941 film That Hamilton Woman Laurence Olivier played Lord Nelson opposite Vivien Leigh’s Emma Hamilton. The wife of the British Ambassador in Naples, William Hamilton, was clearly not the only feather in the admiral's cap. The sparkling turban decoration,...
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Republic Day

Monica's meanderings

By Cornucopia | October 29, 2017


In a year that has been one of the most financially crippling in its 500-year history the Grand Bazaar resiliantly raises morale by celebrating today's Republic Day (Cumhuriyet Bayramı) with all the gusto it can summon. Here flags and Atatürk banners bring a festive glow the Yağlıkçılar Sokak, the lively...
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Dimitrie Cantemir finds a new audience

Jordi Savall plays in his Ottoman world

By Cornucopia UK | October 24, 2017


The concert at the Wigmore Hall in London on Saturday (see Events), given by Jordi Savall and Hespèrion XXI, is an opportunity for a British audience to get to know more about Dimitrie Cantemir (1673–1723), whose collection of Turkish, Armenian and Sephardic works in his Book of the Science of...
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Portrait of an artist

The muralist that inspired the cover of the new Cornucopia

By Cornucopia | October 23, 2017


Barış Suyabatmaz, the artist whose mural features so prominently in Monica Fritz's photograph on the cover of the latest Cornucopia, out this week, made his career following his family’s footsteps. He is the grandson and son of Istanbul sign-painters and the great-grandson of an Ottoman calligraphist and teaches Traditional Arts...
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