“What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!”

Istanbul Research Institute’s exhibition at the Pera Museum, titled “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!”: Byzantium in Popular Culture, navigated through the eclectic presence of Byzantium in popular culture. Curated by Emir Alışık and with contributions from its advisors—Brigitte Pitarakis, Elif Demirtiken, Felice Lifshitz, Haris Theodorelis-Rigas, Jeremy J. Swist, Marco Fasolio, Roland Betancourt, Sinan Ekim, Vedran Bileta, and Yağmur Karakaya—the exhibition explored multiple and conflicting meanings of Byzantinism and questioned popular culture’s interaction with the Byzantine legacy by scrutinizing a selection of motifs representing Byzantium in various media.

Accompanied by a comprehensive exhibition catalogue, “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!” borrowed its title from Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu’s novel Panorama I-II (1953–1954), in which the protagonist exclaimed these words out of frustration with postwar Turkish society. Karaosmanoğlu knew precisely what he meant by Byzantinism, referring not only to the social unrest and hostility among the nation’s citizens but also to the superstitions that raged in society at the time as people struggled to explain the chaos around them. The exhibition stripped Karaosmanoğlu’s exclamation of its historical connotations and took it at face value—as a genuine question—while also aiming, among other things, to show that Constantinople/Istanbul was naturally—historically and geographically—Byzantinism’s home turf.

While the academic and archaeological “rediscovery” of Byzantium in the 19th and early 20th centuries had broad repercussions across various artistic expressions such as painting, architecture, drama, music, and literature, the fascination with Byzantium amplified over time and blossomed into new directions. This included unlikely music and literary genres, evolving film-making techniques, textile production, and new narrative forms like graphic novels.

As access to Byzantine heritage in Constantinople gradually intensified, the material sources of inspiration for Byzantinism shifted from Ravenna to Constantinople. The urban framework of Byzantium’s capital and its inhabitants lay at the core of a contemporary, renewed interest in the subject. These popular materials broke through the boundaries of historical re-enactment and fiction, forging new ways to appropriate Byzantine forms, history, and materiality as tools to tell unique and modern stories. Although Byzantine history was sometimes mobilized to incite hostilities through the manipulation of historical facts, the Byzantine legacy was also frequently utilized to reflect on complex sociopolitical issues—both of which were critically represented in “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!”. By bringing together contemporary novels, metal music, comics and graphic novels, visual arts, video games, movies, and fashion, the exhibition revealed Byzantinism as a far-reaching phenomenon—present even in places where one might least expect to find it.

Click here to listen to the “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!” podcast!

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