“What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!”

Istanbul Research Institute’s exhibition at the Pera Museum called “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!”: Byzantium in Popular Culture, curated by Emir Alışık, navigates through the eclectic presence of Byzantium in popular culture. With the contribution of 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 explores multiple and conflicting meanings of Byzantinism and questions popular culture’s interaction with the Byzantine legacy by scrutinizing a selection of motifs representing Byzantium in popular culture.

Accompanied by a comprehensive exhibition catalogue, “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!” borrows its title from Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu’s novel Panorama I-II (1953–1954), where his protagonist exclaims these lines, being frustrated with postwar Turkish society. Karaosmanoğlu knew precisely what he meant by Byzantinism, referring to not only the social unrest and hostility among the nation’s citizens but also the superstitions raging among society at the time, for they found the chaos they were living in otherwise inexplicable. The exhibition has stripped Karaosmanoğlu’s exclamation of its connotations and has taken it at face value, as a genuine question, all the while aiming—among other things—to show that Constantinople/Istanbul is naturally—historically and geographically—Byzantinism’s home turf.

While the academic and archaeological “rediscovery” of Byzantium in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries had in counterpart wide repercussions throughout a wide variety of artistic expressions like painting, architecture, drama, music, and literature, the fascination for Byzantium was amplified over time and blossomed into new directions—from unlikely music and literature genres and painting and film-making techniques to textile production and new narrative mediums like graphic novels.

As access to Byzantine heritage in Constantinople gradually intensified, access to material sources of inspiration for Byzantinism marked a shift from Ravenna to Constantinople. The urban framework of Byzantium’s capital city and its inhabitants are at the core of the contemporary renewed interest in it. These popular materials have broken the boundaries of historical re-enactment and historical fiction, forging the exploration of new ways to appropriate Byzantine forms, history, and materiality as a means to tell unique stories. Although Byzantine history is sometimes mobilized to kindle hostilities by the manipulation of historical facts, the Byzantine legacy is frequently utilized to reflect on complicated sociopolitical issues, too, and are both critically represented in “What Byzantinism Is This in Istanbul!”. Bringing together contemporary novels, metal music, comics and graphic novels, visual arts, video games, movies, and fashion, the exhibition reveals how Byzantinism is a far-stretching phenomenon to be encountered even in places one does not usually look.

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

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