In a world where people only refer to "Windows" as an operating system, a manifold exhibition on physical windows is welcoming the spring season, filling the Arkas Art Center, a contemporary art museum with one of the largest private art collections with over 2000 works of art, located in the Turkish city of Izmir with fresh air.
"Windows in the Arkas Collection" exhibition focuses on relations between artists and the motif of windows, ranging from the 18th to the 20th century, with a selection of 90 works by many prominent artists including Jean Leon Gerome, Paul Signac, Bernard Buffet, and Hoca Ali Rıza.
The exhibition will be open to visitors until July 23.
The exhibition offers a pluralistic approach to viewing the window and how we see from and through it, exploring interactions, similarities, and differences among works that represent different periods or styles in art history.
During the press conference before the opening of the exhibition, Lucien Arkas, the chairperson of the board of Arkas Holding, said, "Painting is the artist's window opening to the world. The 'Windows in the Arkas Collection' exhibition allows us to see how the window theme emerged in different works with different art styles. I see these thematic exhibitions as a way of presenting original perspectives, providing new meanings to works, making the invisible visible, and, on the other hand, as a window to the collection."
"Windows in painting turn the outside world into a part of the interior, symbolizing deep feelings such as hope, longing, and freedom, while sometimes appearing as a representation of life and existence. With this exhibition, which aims to read the window as a 'threshold' beyond being a commonplace object or a familiar architectural element in daily life, we invite visitors to embark on a discovery journey," said Müjde Unustası, the director of the art center.
The curator of the exhibition, Jean Luc Maeso said: "With a selection from the Arkas Collection, we aim to remind the development of the relations between artists and the window motif from the 18th to the end of the 20th century in this exhibition. The window, which has maintained its relevance with its role in perspective studies and its symbolism, has been a preferred motif in artists' imagination. Undoubtedly, the window contributes to constructing aesthetic, poetic, and symbolic space opening the way for an infinite series of potential dialectics."
The "Windows in the Arkas Collection" exhibition, hosts works by Turkish painters from different periods such as Hoca Ali Rıza, a Turkish painter and art teacher, who received an award from Sultan Abdülhamid II, Şevket Dağ, the founder of the Ottoman Painters' Society, Namık Ismail, a Turkish Impressionist painter and art educator, who received his training in France and finally realist painter Nuri Iyem.
