Istanbul may be rich in cultural history, with 18th-century mosques, sultans’ palaces and Byzantine relics, but its global contemporary art offerings are nowhere near that of London, Paris and New York. Demet Muftuoglu and her organization Istanbul’74 answer the deficit with the Istanbul International Art and Culture Festival, also known as the IST. Festival and Istancool, a three-day event filled with discussions, film screenings, performances and more.
For the 2014 edition, Muftuoglu and Istanbul’74 worked with the Turkish Ministry of Culture & Tourism to create a “cultural mosaic,” by inviting a range of artists who included James Nares, British fashion photographer Tim Walker, Turkish graffiti pioneer Tunç "Turbo" Dindaş, Cuban-American artist José Parlá, French artist JR, Scottish artist-cum-poet Robert Montgomery and American photographer Peter Beard along with a variety of guests from the worlds of fashion, music and film, like Cyprian designer Hussein Chalayan, Scottish musician Shirley Manson and American director Abel Ferrara, several of whom stayed at the iconic Pera Palace Jumeirah.
During the day the public had the opportunity to attend a series of free discussions held at the Pera Museum and Vakko Fashion Center. Parlá and JR screened their documentary Wrinkles of the City, which documents their process creating a citywide installation that featured portraits of the city’s elderly denizens emblazoned on its buildings for the 2012 Havana Biennial. “We would drive around the city and search for elderly people,” said JR. W magazine editor Stefano Tonchi chatted with Walker about the inspiration behind his fantasy-filled photography. Dindaş discussed design and commerce. The next day James Nares discussed his film Street, a portrait of the people who fill New York’s sidewalks, with Parlá and Muftuoglu’s husband, filmmaker Alphan Eseli. “The students from Istanbul, they’re coming for free and getting so inspired, maybe they don’t have the chance to meet Tim Walker, or maybe they cannot afford it to go and travel to other cities and to meet them,” said Muftuoglu.
By night guests attended exclusive, invite-only dinners and parties at some of Istanbul’s most picturesque sites, like the Çırağan Palace, a luxury hotel that was once a Ottoman palace, which hosted the opening night dinner alongside the Bosphorus. The second night, guests headed to Marmara Esma Sultan, a historical mansion that’s also on the shores of the Bosphorus, for the nef-sponsored IST. Festival Gala, which had a hot start, thanks to Montgomery lighting one of his poems on fire. Afterwards, attendees headed downstairs to a pop-up of André Saraiva’s Le Baron nightclub.
Istancool 2014 was cultural diplomacy at its finest; Muftuoglu and Istanbul’74 succeed in creating a rich and memorable international cultural mosaic for Turkey’s largest city.
