• Publish Date
  12.06.2021
• Subscribe
• Share

Metro Tunnels Are Opening To Art

Metro Istanbul, one of the affiliates of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM), is opening its doors to an unusual exhibition. The exhibition titled “Finding Healing in Istanbul” can be visited at the Yaklasim Tuneli of M2 Yenikapi-Haciosman Metro Line in Taksim between 19th June and 19th July.

Turkey's largest urban rail system operator, Metro Istanbul, will host an unusual exhibition. The exhibition titled Finding Healing in Istanbul, which will be held in collaboration with Karsi Sanat in the Yaklasim Tuneli on M2 Yenikapi-Haciosman Metro Line, will be open for exhibition in between 19th June and 19th July.
Metro Istanbul General Manager Ozgur Soy reminded that in Istanbul, one of the few metropolises of the world, daily business makes it difficult to spare time for cultural and artistic activities. 

“We will turn metro into cultural-art crossroads”
Underlining that Istanbulites spend a significant amount of time in the metro every day, General Manager Soy said, “A very important part of Istanbul's resources are allocated to rail system investments, and we are getting closer to our goal of being the backbone of public transportation with our increasing usage rate. Metros are not only transportation channels consisting of trains, but also a part of people's daily life. We have an area of over 1 million square meters, and we want to position these areas as cultural-art crossroads to keep up with the pace of metropolitan life, and make them areas where Istanbulites can have a pleasant time on their way to home, work or their loved ones. We want Istanbulites using our metro to see works of art in different branches on our walls. In this context, we have hosted works such as photography exhibitions and wall painting practices at various points until today. We think that this approach will be valuable for artists in Turkey as well, because they too have difficulties in finding spaces to express themselves. Our artists will meet the people of the city without intermediaries; art will find a place for itself not only in museums at exhibitions, but also in life by metro. For this reason, we want to include more works of art in our spaces”.

“We want to bring different event venues to Istanbul”
Informing that they will organise an exhibition in the Yaklasim Tunnel at Taksim Station in addition to the stations, General Manager Ozgur Soy said, “The fact that the tunnel is located in a central area like Taksim is an important advantage in terms of hosting cultural and artistic events. We want to bring this special place into Istanbul, which opens out and inside at the same time as an escape and approach in the centre of Istanbul, and goes deep into the city, to Istanbul through art. We dream that the tunnel will host art events, albeit intermittently, in order to open this impressive place to visitors, to position Istanbul in the cultural and artistic life and to approach the heart of the city with art. Yaklasim Tuneli; with its atmosphere, architectural features and memory, it provides a unique context for the exhibition Finding Healing in Istanbul. On the other hand, with its location and opportunities, it deserves to be included in the map of culture and arts areas in Turkey and even in the world.”
Curated by Melis Bektas, the exhibition will feature the works of important artists such as Arek Qadrra, Berka Beste Kopuz, Canavar, Deniz Cimlikaya, Ece Eldek, Eda Aslan, Eda Emirdag & İrem Nalca, Emin Koseoglu, Ipek Yucesoy, Ismet Koroglu, Marina Papazyan, Metehan Ozcan, and SABO, Seydi Murat Koç, Umut Erbas and Yekateryna Grygorenko will be featured.
Also; Researchers Cemre Gurbuz, Gabriel Doyle and Naomi Cohen, who study the history and relations of Surp Pirgic, Balikli Rum, Surp Agop, Balat Or-Ahayim and Bulgar Hospital, which were established in the Ottoman Empire at the height of the 19th century cholera epidemic, will exhibit some of their work with an installation mapped with stories and archives.

About Taksim Yaklasim Tuneli:
Approach tunnels are tunnels that are bored for logistics purposes during the construction of metro lines and are connected to the main line or secondary roads. Although some of these tunnels are closed after the construction, some approach tunnels are kept open to be used in critical situations for city life, such as passenger evacuation in emergencies, even transportation of firefighters and medical teams, as well as providing transportation of maintenance vehicles or work machines to the line and material transfers. The Yaklasim Tuneli, which was bored during the construction of the Taksim Station, whose foundation was laid in 1992, of the M2 Yenikapi-Haciosman Metro Line, as it is today, is one of the tunnels that is still open.
This tunnel, which is 200 meters long, 4 meters wide and 4.5 meters high, has an important feature in that it opens one end to life going underground and the other end to Taksim Harbiye, one of the most active points of Istanbul. Taksim Yaklasim Tuneli, which descends in the heart of the metropolis to its veins and the metro line from Harbiye, will bring different excitements to the people of Istanbul. Tunnel hosted the exhibition organised in collaboration with Karsi Sanat in 2005, but was left alone afterwards. The tunnel, which still bears the traces of the exhibition held in 2005, is preparing to open its heart to artists by hosting a new exhibition in 2021.
 

All News