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Osman Hamdi Bey and Victor Marie de Launay: The popular costumes of Turkey in 1873
- Central European University Press
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OSMAN HAMDİ BEY AND VICTOR MARIE DE LAUNAY: THE POPULAR COSTUMES OF TURKEY IN 1873 Title: Les costumes populaires de la Turquie en 1873/Elbise-i ‛Osmaniyye (The popular costumes of Turkey in 1873) Originally published: Istanbul, The Levant Times and Shipping Gazette Press, 1873 Language: Text in French; captions of photographic plates in Ottoman Turkish A Turkish translation has been published with the title 1873 Senesinde Türkiye’de Yerel Kıyafetler, translated by Erol Üyepazarcı (Istanbul: Sabanc ı Üniversitesi, 1999). The excerpts used are from the original edition of 1873, pp. 7–9 and 17–18. About the authors Osman Hamdi Bey [1842, Istanbul – 1910, Istanbul): Ottoman official and painter. In his youth, Osman Hamdi was sent to Paris by his father (İbrahim Edhem Paşa, a prominent member of the Tanzimat elite) to study law, where, instead, he attended classes on art and archaeology in the Ecole des Beaux-Arts until his return home in 1871. Although Hamdi Bey was not a registered student of the Ecole, it is generally assumed that he had worked in the ateliers of the eminent Orientalists Jean-Léon Gérôme and Gustave Boulanger. Osman Hamdi became one of the most active figures of Ottoman cultural life after returning to the imperial capital. From 1881 to 1910 he served as the director of the Imperial Museum of Antiquities. During his term, he directed several archaeological excavations within the imperial territories and initiated official regulations and laws that were aimed at stopping the pillaging of historical ruins by European dealers and archaeologists. Later, Osman Hamdi played a major role in the establishment of the Imperial School of Fine Arts (1882) where he taught painting until his death. In the footsteps of his masters, Osman Hamdi Bey produced paintings in the Orientalist manner throughout his artistic career. But in contrast to the majority of European artists, for whom the ideological constructs about the East existed as an uncritically accepted discursive substructure, the Ottoman artist manipulated the Orientalist genre as an instrument to deliver a clear alternative message that was informed by a larger cultural and ideological agenda. Osman Hamdi employed and appropriated European techniques of representation in order to construct what he held to be “objective” scenes of a putatively native and pristine Ottoman/Islamic past, albeit with a highly picturesque and self-exoticizing technique of representation. Marie de Launay and Osman Hamdi Bey were among the most vocal and productive on the Ottoman intellectual scene striving to assess, salvage and promote the traditional arts. OSMAN HAMDI AND MARIE DE LAUNAY: THE POPULAR COSTUMES OF TURKEY 175 Main works: Le Tumulus de Nemroud Dagh (co-authored with [Yervant] Osgan Efendi, 1883); Les Ruines d’Aslan-Tasch (1889); Une Necropole royale à Sidon: Fouilles de Hamdi Bey (co-authored with Salomon T. Reinach, 1892). Victor Marie de Launay [1822 or 1823, Paris – ?, Istanbul]: Artist and amateur historian, an Ottoman official of French origin. According to the official Ottoman biographical records, Marie de Launay received most of his education at home, under the supervision of his father, César Marie de Launay, who was an official connected to the palace. The records indicate that de Launay also benefited from the tutorship of a certain Léon Gautier (most probably the eminent philologist and member of the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres), whose views on medieval history and folk traditions must have left an indelible mark on de Launay. Throughout his versatile career in the Ottoman Empire, he displayed a similarly romantic enthusiasm for Early Ottoman/Late Medieval history and for local customs and popular lore. Marie de Launay arrived in Istanbul around the time of the Crimean War, and in 1857 became the assistant engineer , archivist and draughtsman of the newly established Pera Municipality (the Sixth Municipal District) in Istanbul, which was the model area for instituting modern municipal reforms at the time. By virtue of his scholarly interest in architecture, art and traditional crafts, Marie de Launay became deeply involved in the representation of the Ottoman Empire in world expositions throughout his official career. He contributed to the Ottoman exhibits not only as an organizer and an author, but also as an exhibitor— an amateur artist and collector who displayed his own paintings (mostly scenes about medieval history), illustrations of Ottoman types and costumes, and collections of handcrafted objects on various national and international occasions. Through his official role he had a chance to be involved in many substantial publications related to the...