Art and Culture
TURKEY
Osman Hamdi Bey
By Buse
Osman Hamdi Bey (1842 – 24 February
1910) was an Ottoman statesman,
intellectual, art expert and also a
prominent and
pioneering
Turkish painter.
He was also an
accomplished
archaeologist,
and
is
considered as
the pioneer of
the museum
c u r a t o r ’ s
profession in
Turkey. He was
the founder of
I s t a n b u l
Archaeology
Museums and
of ?stanbul
Academy of
Fine
Arts,
known today as
the
Mimar
Sinan University
of Fine Arts.
Osman Hamdi went to primary school in
the popular Constantinople quarter of
Be?ikta?, after which he studied Law, first
in Istanbul, and then in Paris. However,
he decided to pursue his interest in
painting instead, left the law program,
and trained under French orientalist
painters Jean-Léon Gérôme and Gustave
Boulanger.During his nine-year stay in
Paris, the international capital of fine arts
in that period, he showed a keen interest
for the artistic events of his day. He also
met many of the Young Turks and though
exposed to their liberal ideas, as the son
of a loyal Ottoman Pa?a, did not
participate in their
activities.
Osman Hamdi
also met his first
wife Maria, a
French woman, in
Pa r i s w h e n h e
was a student.
They had two
daughters.They
stayed married
for ten years. His
second wife’s
name was Marie
and she was
French ,too. They
met in Vienna
and
got
married.They had
four children.
Osman Hamdi is
famous for his
painting; “ Turtle Handler(Tamer)”
Experts say that the man’s heels are as
good as real ones.
There are a few arguments about his
paintings;
1)
It is claimed that in this painting the
man in red symbolizes an exhausted
intellectual who wants to modernize an
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