Salt Beyoğlu
İstiklal Caddesi 136
Beyoğlu Istanbul
Turkey
Salt Galata
Bankalar Caddesi 11
Karaköy Istanbul
Turkey
We’ve Been at the Tapestry Studio Since the 90s at Salt Beyoğlu
September 19, 2025–March 1, 2026
We’ve Been at the Tapestry Studio Since the 90s focuses on the Tapestry Studio, established in 1976-77 under Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University’s Department of Painting, and its approach to art education. While exploring its relationship with everyday life, the exhibition also highlights the potential of creative dissent and collective production. Tracing the physical and conceptual connections meticulously built since the founding of the studio, it presents a collage of collaborative and individual works, archival materials, and testimonies of artists who have passed through this space.
The Tapestry Studio has carved out a unique position both within and outside the institution. Combining carpet weaving education with contemporary art, it has embraced a pedagogical approach rooted in “learning together” and offered programs open to everyone. It created an exceptional model that dismantled the gendered hierarchies and entrenched bureaucracies inherent in academia, bringing together students, artists, guests, and cultural workers around the same table. Most importantly, this model did not exclude the street. The dynamism initiated by visual artist and academic Gülçin Aksoy (1965-2024), who was appointed as an assistant in 1992, along with a group of students and colleagues, gradually transformed the studio from the late 1990s onward. This synergy spilled out of the studio door—which Aksoy kept open both physically and conceptually—first into the university corridors, and then into Istanbul’s contemporary art scene. The studio’s production model multiplied, diversified, and expanded through the relationships it forged with independent art initiatives, feminist circles, and interdisciplinary collectives in the city during the 2000s.
Drawing inspiration from the studio's well-known motto—“same direction, different pedal; different direction, same pedal”—the exhibition sheds light on the history of shared practices and individual pursuits within the studio.
Dark World at Salt Galata
July 23–December 14, 2025
Dark World is the result of a long-term interdisciplinary research project by artist Mike Bode and screenwriter Caner Yalçın. The exhibition investigates the intricate story of the film of the same title, directed by Metin Erksan and written by Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu, situating it within the cultural landscape of 1950s Turkey.
Shot with a social realist perspective in the village of Sivrialan and the town of Ürgüp in rural Anatolia, the film portrays the life of Âşık Veysel, from his childhood to his emergence as a renowned folk poet, intertwined with a melodramatic love story. Yet the film’s narrative takes an unexpected turn after parts of the film were remade to align with the agricultural development and rural modernization policies of the period. The footage of combine harvesters in the Hudson fields—sourced from the United States Information Service, according to Erksan—along with constructed scenes of a village school and dispensary allegedly filmed on the outskirts of Istanbul, were used to present an idealized image of rural life. These additions sidelined Veysel’s life story and transformed the film into a vehicle for propagating official ideology. Among the reasons behind this shift are the censorship rulings issued by the Central Film Control Commission in Ankara between December 1952 and November 1953. Although the reports did not explicitly state which scenes needed to be censored, they pointed to a broader concern about portraying an idealized vision of society. Following edits made by the producer, the reworked version was eventually premiered on December 31, 1953, under the title Âşık Veysel’in Hayatı [The Life of Âşık Veysel]. The production process, commercial interests, and ideological tensions turned the film into an eclectic work whose entire character shifted in tandem with its title.
Today, what survives is a disjointed montage, deleted or added scenes, audio disruptions, and narratives built around them. The pre-censored cut and the premiered version are still unknown, while the copies in circulation differ somewhat in sound, image, and editing. Adding to this fragmented legacy is a 35mm nitrate print, recently discovered in the archive of Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, which includes footage unearthed for the first time.
Dark World approaches the film not as a coherent narrative but as a material object shaped by cultural, political, and historical forces. A selection of research material and a series of video installations are accompanied by a script that follows the interventions and alterations the film has undergone, as well as divergences between existing copies. Rather than attempting to reconstruct the original version, the exhibition opens up multiple trajectories through which to examine the operative logics of censorship, the conditions of the film’s production, and the ideological apparatuses that informed its circulation and reception.
Founded in 2011 by Garanti BBVA, Salt is a not-for-profit cultural institution engaging in research, exhibitions, publications, web projects, and public programs at the intersections of visual practices, the built environment, social life, and economic history.
