Known as the painter of Anatolia, Yalçın Gökçebağ is presenting recent artwork he created feeding on the pure and poetic concept of nature at ISTANBUL ART212 Art Gallery with a new exhibition titled Anatolian Dreams.
In the exhibition, there are 13 paintings in which images of rural life with pastoral contents are the focus.
Gökçebağ explained that he started to paint by thinking about Anatolia when he was working at Akşehir Primary School. He gave some clues about his works in his latest exhibition by saying: "Carriages carrying beets passed by my window toward the end of spring and they especially affected me. The horses that pull the carriages, their harnesses, the adornments on them, the carriages' structure in line with their loads and the sounds of the wheels drew my attention. I reflected what I felt on my canvases while visiting Anatolia and passing by wheat, cotton fields, apples, oranges or tea gardens."
The artist's exhibition can be seen until May 15.
About Yalçın Gökçebağ
Yalçın Gökçebağ was born in Denizli in 1944. After attending a painter's workshop at Çapa Primary School in Istanbul, Gökçebağ learned basic painting techniques from Malik Aksel and İlhami Gökçebağ over three years. In 1961, he was assigned as a teacher in Denizli province's Şirin village. After working for a year there, he graduated from the Gazi Training Institute's Painting Department, which he started in 1963. He was assigned to Akşehir Primary School as an art teacher three years later. In 1970, he was a teacher in İzmir province.
Gökçebağ started to work as a cameraman in TRT, the national broadcaster, in 1971. He started to work as an academic at the Fine Arts Department at Middle East Technical University (METU) in 1990. He created 60 solo exhibitions, 12 of which were organized abroad. He has also participated in many group exhibitions. The artist still continues to produce art in his workshop in Istanbul.