1840 | The First Photo in Smyrna

September 21, 2016, 1:49 pm

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Mavi Boncuk | 

Frédéric Auguste Antoine Goupil-Fesquet (1806-1893) travelled to the East in the company of his uncle, French artist Émile Jean-Horace Vernet (1789-1863), whose father and grandfather were also renowned painters, and of Gaspard-Pierre-Gustave Joly de Lotbinière (1798-1865), who is famous for having taken the first photographs of the Acropolis of Athens and the Pyramids of Egypt. The small party, ideal in number, started out from Marseilles in October 1839. After Malta, they arrived at the island of Syros, of which Goupil-Fesquet describes the marketplace, the port, the mills, the shops and the traditional coffeehouses. The travellers continued on to Santorini, Crete and Smyrna[1], and subsequently visited Egypt (Alexandria, the Nile, Cairo), the Holy Land, Syria, and made a short stay in Constantinople. The party returned to France in February 1840. They intended to print daguerreotypes[2] with views of the East for an important edition with images in this new technique, which was published in Paris in 1842 with the title "Les excursions daguerriennes". 

[1] Daguerreotypes which he took of Izmir from the decks of the Iena are mentioned in his diary for 13 February 1840. Since the necessary printing techniques had not yet been developed it was impossible to publish these photographs in books and newspapers. Instead artists copied the photographs for reproduction, adding half-tones and livening them up with the figures of people and animals which were necessarily absent from the scene due to the long exposure period.

[2] Daguerreotype process, or daguerreotypy, was the first publicly announced photographic process, and for nearly twenty years, it was the one most commonly used. It was invented by Louis-Jaques-Mandé Daguerre and introduced worldwide in 1839.By 1860, new processes which were less expensive and produced more easily viewed images had almost completely replaced it. During the past few decades, there has been a small-scale revival of daguerreotypy among photographers interested in making artistic use of early photographic processes.

To make a daguerreotype, the daguerreotypist would polish a sheet of silver-plated copper to a mirror finish, treat it with fumes that made its surface light sensitive, expose it in a camera for as long as was judged to be necessary, which could be as little as a few seconds for brightly sunlit subjects or much longer with less intense lighting; make the resulting latent image on it visible by fuming it with mercury vapor; remove its sensitivity to light by liquid chemical treatment, rinse and dry it, then seal the easily marred result behind glass in a protective enclosure.

SOURCE

Greek pirate of the Aegean. Palicari. 



Horace Vernet as he was dressed during his voyage. 


Modern female costume of the East. Older female costume from Smyrna.

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PYD Project | Then and Now

September 23, 2016, 8:54 am

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The Turkish military intervention in Syria, code-named by Turkey as Operation Euphrates Shield (Turkish: Fırat Kalkanı Harekâtı), is an ongoing cross-border operation by the Turkish military and allied groups in the Syrian Civil War. Operations are ongoing in the region between the Euphrates river to the east and the rebel-held area around Azaz to the west. The Turkish military and Turkey-backed Syrian rebel groups, some of which use the Free Syrian Army label, have been fighting against forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as well as against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) since 24 August 2016.

October 23, 2015 
POLICYWATCH 2510 

The U.S.-PYD-Turkey Puzzle Soner Cagaptay and Andrew J. Tabler| Also available in العربية 

SOURCE 

Article | Is the U.S. behind Fethullah Gulen?

September 23, 2016, 2:38 pm

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Mavi Boncuk |

JULY 30, 2016

Article by Dany Rodrik | Is the U.S. behind Fethullah Gulen? SOURCE

Whenever I talk with another Turk about the Gulen movement, a question invariably props up: is the CIA behind Gulen? In fact for most Turks this is a rather rhetorical question, with an incontrovertible answer. The belief that Gulen and his activities are orchestrated by the U.S. is as strongly held as it is widespread among Turks of all political coloration – secular or Islamist.

This is my attempt at providing a reasoned answer to the question. My conclusion in brief: I don’t think Gulen is a tool of the U.S. or has received support from the U.S. for its clandestine operations. But it is possible that some elements within the U.S. national security apparatus think Gulen furthers their agenda, is worth protecting on U.S. soil, and have so far prevailed on other voices in the establishment with different views. Regardless, the U.S. needs to seriously reconsider its attitude towards Gulen and his movement.

Direct support?

Those who believe the U.S. is behind Gulen typically make two arguments. First, they point to how Gulen got his green card in the first place. The long list of individuals who wrote letters of recommendations on Gulen’s behalf includes two long-time CIA employees (George Fidas and Graham Fuller) and a former U.S. ambassador to Turkey (Morton Abramowitz). These individuals write in their individual capacities and their advocacy was based both on Gulen’s persecution by the then-secularist Turkish judiciary and on Gulen’s apparent promotion of a moderate brand of Islam.

On the latter question, at least, it is fair to assume that these recommenders had only limited knowledge of Gulen’s full corpus, which includes some fairly incendiary stuff against Jews, Christians, the United States, and Western Europe. (Some years ago I showed one of the letter writers a particularly anti-semitic sermons and asked him if he was aware of it; he said he had no idea.)

However, the more important point about his green card that – and one that is overlooked in Turkey -- is that the U.S. administration was in fact opposed to giving Gulen a green card. It rejected Gulen’s application, and then strenuously objected in court when Gulen’s lawyers appealed. Lawyers for the Department of Homeland Security were scathing about Gulen’s qualifications and argued there was no evidence he was an individual of exceptional ability in the field of education: “far from being an academic, plaintiff seeks to cloak himself with academic status by commissioning academics to write about him and paying for conferences at which his work is studied.”

Gulen owes his residency not to the U.S. executive branch (and whichever intelligence agency may be hiding behind it), but to a federal judge with scant interest in foreign policy or intelligence matters who somehow nonetheless ruled in his favor. The judge’s argument was that the Administration had construed the relevant field of “education” too narrowly, and should have considered Gulen’s contributions to other areas such as “theology, political science, and Islamic studies.”

The second argument is that Gulen and his followers would not have been so successful in spreading their empire and influence without active U.S. support. I think this severely underestimates the movement’s own capabilities. Gulen has long stressed education, organization, and secrecy. His movement has invested in raising a “golden generation” of smart, well-trained individuals. Lack of resources has never been a constraint, thanks to the contributions of an army of devout businessmen. As the AKP found out to its own chagrin, its most capable and competent public servants turned out to be serving a different master in Pennsylvania. And in any case, this argument exaggerates U.S.’ own capabilities in my view: given the CIA’s history of blunders, there is in fact much that it could learn from the Gulen movement on cloak-and-dagger operations.

The critical question here is whether there is anything the movement has done that it could not have done without active U.S. backing. Did it really need the help of some U.S. intelligence agency to expand its charter-school network, to stage the Sledgehammer trial, or to infiltrate and organize within the Turkish military? I don’t think so.    

Tacit support?

The U.S. government may not have had a direct hand in Gulen’s activities, but it is more difficult to dismiss the argument that it provided tacit support – or that some parts of the U.S. administration prevailed on other parts who were less keen on Gulen.  

Judging by Wikileaks cables, U.S. diplomats in Turkey were exceptionally knowledgeable about Gulenist activities. These cables are in fact a goldmine of information on the Gulen movement. Form these we learn, among others, about the elaborate ruses used by Gulenist sympathizers to infiltrate the Turkish army, Gulen’s request for support from the Jewish Rabbinate’s during his green card application, and the attempt by sympathizers within the Turkish national police to get a “clean bill of health” for Gulen from the U.S. consulate in Istanbul. We also learn that even in the heyday of their alliance, Gulenists presciently regarded Erdogan as a liability.

Perhaps of more direct interest to the U.S., foreign service officers have long been aware that many Turks have been obtaining visas under false pretenses, with the ultimate aim of ending up as teachers in Gulen’s charter schools. Yet apparently nothing was ever done to stop this flow, nor to hold the movement to account. A ridiculous number of H-1B visas -- which require demonstration that no qualified U.S. workers are available -- have been issued to Turkish teachers in these schools. One naturally wonders why the U.S. administration never clamped down on the Gulen movement for apparent visa fraud.

The same question arises with respect to the widespread pattern of financial improprieties that has been uncovered in Gulen’s charter schools. A whistleblower has provided evidence that Turkish teachers are required to kick back a portion of their salary to the movement. The FBI has seized documents revealing preferential awarding of contracts to Turkish-connected businesses. Such improprieties are apparently still under investigation. But the slow pace at which the government has moved does make one suspect that there is no overwhelming desire to bring Gulen to justice.  

Gulen typically defends himself against such charges by saying that the schools are run by sympathizers and are not directly under his control. Yet the fact is that he took direct credit for the schools in his green card application, saying he had overseen their establishment.

Then there is the Sledgehammer case, which has the Gulen movement’s fingerprints all over it. This and the closely related Ergenekon trials did untold damage to the military of U.S.’ Nato ally. The jailing of hundreds of officers, including a former chief of staff, sowed a climate of fear and suspicion within the army and sapped military morale. Perhaps the U.S. was bamboozled, like many others, early on about these trials. But by now it should know that these sham trials were launched and stage managed by Gulenists. American officials have been quick to complain in public about the damage the post-coup purge has done to Turkish military capabilities. Yet there was not a peep from them during the Ergenekon and Sledgehammer witch hunts; and nor has the U.S. administration expressed any discontent about the Gulen movement’s role in them since.

The failed coup

The mystery only deepens after the botched coup. The U.S. has demanded credible evidence from Turkey on Gulen’s involvement, which is as it should be. But beyond that, it appears from the outside as if administration officials have been interested mostly in throwing cold water on the Turkish government’s claim that Gulen was behind the coup – a claim that is largely justified.

The most egregious example is that of James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence. Asked whether Turkish allegations that Gulen planned the attempted coup passed the “smell test” of credibility, Clapper answered: “No. Not to me.” Clapper said Secretary of State Kerry “was right on the ball” to press the Turks to back up their extradition request with evidence of Gulen’s involvement, adding: “We haven’t seen it yet. We certainly haven’t seen it in intel.”

Now coming from the head of American intelligence, this is no less than a stunning statement. As the Wikileaks cables I referred to above make clear, the State Department, at least, has been well aware of Gulenist infiltration of the Turkish military for quite some time. The Gulenists’s role in Sledgehammer, which led to the discharge of many of the most Kemalist/secularist officers in the military is equally clear. Beyond Sledgehammer, the Gulenists’ wide range of clandestine operations against opponents in Turkey must be well known to American intelligence. So when the most senior intelligence officer in the U.S. instinctively brushes off Gulen’s possible involvement, it looks awfully like he is either incompetent or has something to hide.

Since Clapper’s statement was made, the head of the Turkish military, who was held hostage by the putschists during the coup attempt, has said that one of his captors offered to put him in touch with Gulen directly. This, on its own, is prima facie evidence of Gulen’s involvement, and likely passes the “probable cause” test that is required for extradition. Incredibly, administration officials are still quoted as saying “there is no credible evidence of Mr. Gulen’s personal involvement.” In other words, these officials must think that the army chief of their NATO ally is lying.     

(I will not get into former CIA official Graham Fuller’s silly piece exonerating the Gulen movement, which is at best woefully uninformed, at worst willfully misleading. Fuller has been retired for some time, and I doubt he is playing any role in administration policy.)

So what the hell is going on here?

In light of the confusing signals that come out of the U.S., and the apparent desire of many people in or close to the administration to defend Gulen, it’s not difficult to empathize with those in Turkey who believe the U.S. must be behind Gulen (and, yes, even the coup attempt). I think it is too farfetched to think that the U.S. knew of beforehand or supported the coup. There were far too many risks and too few benefits for the U.S. to be involved. And contrary to what many people in Turkey believe, U.S. intelligence is far from omniscient – so yes, the coup likely did happen without U.S. knowledge.

But it is not farfetched to think that there are some groups in the administration – perhaps in the intelligence branches – who have been protecting Gulen because they think he is useful to U.S. foreign policy interests. This could be because Gulen’s brand/mask of moderate Islam is a rare thing in that part of the world. It could be because taking Gulen down would only benefit groups in Turkey they consider more inimical to U.S. interests – Erdogan’s AKP and the arch-secularists. It is even possible that the movement has occasionally performed services for U.S. intel operations. (Some of Gulen’s schools in Central Asia were used to “shelter” American spies according to a former Turkish intelligence chief.) That kind of thing would not be beneath either the CIA or the Gulen movement.

Perhaps these groups have so far have had the better of the argument and have held the upper hand in the administration against those in State or elsewhere who know full well what the Gulen movement is up to and would rather see him go. In the aftermath of the coup, perhaps this balance will change in favor of the latter. Perhaps not. Whether it does or not, I think the Gulen issue will ultimately explode in somebody’s face in the U.S. The only questions are whose, and when.

I would be the first to admit that this is just a hypothesis. But if there is a better story that explains the U.S. reaction I’d love to hear it.

Extradition?

It is very unlikely that Gulen would receive a fair trial in Turkey. So the U.S. has a legitimate ground for not extraditing him. But the U.S. foreign policy establishment would be making a very big mistake if they simply dismissed the calls from Turkey about Gulen’s complicity. It is easy for the U.S. to hide behind Erdogan’s clampdown and the ill treatment of the putschists. But the U.S. has considerable explaining to do too.  

Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey (1804 – 1892)

September 23, 2016, 2:55 pm

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1841 self-portrait

Mavi Boncuk | 

Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey (21 October 1804 – 7 December 1892) was a French photographer and draughtsman who was active in the Middle East. His daguerreotypes are the earliest surviving photographs of Greece, Palestine, Egypt, Syria and Turkey. Remarkably, his photographs were only discovered in the 1920s in a storeroom of his estate and then only became known eighty years later.

Girault de Prangey studied painting in Paris at the École des Beaux-Arts and in 1841 he learned daguerreotypy, possibly from Louis Daguerre himself or from Hippolyte Bayard. Girault de Prangey was keenly interested in the architecture of the Middle East, and he toured Italy and the countries of the eastern Mediterranean between 1841 and 1844, producing over 900 daguerreotypes of architectural views, landscapes, and portraits.

After his return to France, Girault de Prangey made watercolour and pen-and-ink studies after his photographs and published a small-edition book of lithographs from them. He also made stereographs of his estate and the exotic plants he collected. Girault de Prangey did not exhibit or otherwise make his photographs known during his lifetime.



 J.-P. Girault de Prangey, 173, Constantinople, Surudjé, 1843., daguerréotype, 12,1 x 9,5 cm. Christie's Image Ltd.

 Constantinople. Pavillon prés du Sérail. , 1843–1843

See also: Alchemy on a PlateThe first photographs of Istanbul BY ELIZABETH MEATH BAKER 

Sold in 2003 for record prices, these magical daguerrotype plates of Istanbul in the 1840s are the earliest known photographic images of the city. They are the work of Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey, an obsessive Frenchman with a passion for Islamic architecture. By Elizabeth Meath Baker.[1]

A view of the Selimiye in Üsküdar taken in 1843. Photograph courtesy of Christies Images Ltd, 2003 

 [1] Elizabeth Meath Baker is a Contributing Editor of Cornucopia, and has written several Trade Secrets articles on art and artisans. She is also a member of the Walsingham Farms Shop Partnership.

Ali Pasha and Vassiliki

September 26, 2016, 9:42 am

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Mavi Boncuk |
Portrait of Kyra Vassiliki, 1850 [1] kira/kyra (lady)

Kyra Vassiliki (Greek: Κυρά Βασιλική 1789 – 1834) was an influential Greek woman brought up in the seraglio of the Ottoman ruler Ali Pasha.

Kyra Vassiliki and Ali Pasha, school of Paul Emil Jacobs, 1844

Vassiliki Kontaxi was born in the Greek village of Plisivitsa in Thesprotia. At the age of twelve she sought an audience with the local Ottoman ruler, Ali Pasha, to intercede for her father's life. Having granted her father pardon, Ali Pasha married Vassiliki in 1808 and she joined his harem. Being allowed to practice her Christian faith, she interceded on behalf of Greeks.In 1818 she became a member of the Greek patriotic organization Filiki Eteria. Vassiliki was directly recruited by one of the three founding members of the organization, Nikolaos Skoufas. During this period she undertook a number of charity initiatives. In 1819–20 she financed a number of restoration works in Mount Athos.

In January 1822, during the last stage of the siege of Ioannina by the Ottoman Sultan's forces, Vassiliki together with Ali Pasha and his private guard escaped to the Ioannina Island. Ali Pasha was executed there on January 22 by an Ottoman delegation, having being declared an outlaw by the Sultan.

Following Ali's death, Vassiliki was sent as a prisoner to the Ottoman capital, Constantinople. She was later pardoned and returned to Greece, which meanwhile gained its independence after the successful Greek War of Independence (1821–30). In 1830, the Greek state gave Vassiliki a medieval tower in Katochi, where she lived the rest of her life. She died of dysentery in 1834.

In 1895, the gold-embroidered velvet purse of Vassiliki was bought by Nikolaos Konstantinidis for 25 drachmas. Vassiliki was depicted by various artists. She is briefly mentioned in a number of 19th century novels such as in Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo[8] and by English author Richard A. Davenport in his The Life of Ali Pasha of Tepeleni, Vizier of Epirus.

Ali Pasha, variously referred to as of Tepelena or of Janina/Yannina/Ioannina, Aslan, "the Lion", or the Lion of Yannina (1740 – 24 January 1822), was a Muslim Albanian ruler who served as an Ottoman pasha of the western part of Rumelia, the Ottoman Empire's European territory, which was referred to as the Pashalik of Yanina. His court was in Ioannina, but the territory he governed incorporated most of Epirus and the western parts of Thessaly and Greek Macedonia in Northern Greece. Ali had three sons: Muhtar Pasha (served in the 1809 war against the Russians), Veli Pasha of Morea and Salih Pasha of Vlore. Ali first appears in historical accounts as the leader of a band of brigands who became involved in many confrontations with Ottoman state officials in Albania and Epirus. 

Pictured: 

"Ali Pasha of Janina Hunting on Lake Butrinto" by Louis Dupré 1825. [2]

He joined the administrative-military apparatus of the Ottoman Empire, holding various posts until 1788 when he was appointed pasha, ruler of the sanjak of Ioannina. His diplomatic and administrative skills, his interest in modernist ideas and concepts, his popular religiousness, his religious neutrality, his win over the bands terrorizing the area, his revengefulness and harshness in imposing law and order, and his looting practices towards persons and communities in order to increase his proceeds cause both the admiration and the criticism of his contemporaries, as well as an ongoing controversy among historians regarding his personality. Ali Pasha of Tepelena died in 1822 at the age of 81 or 82.

Kyra-Vassiliki: Monvoisin painted for the first time a picture of Ali Pasha & Vassiliki in 1832 and exposed it the next year at the Paris Salon; the oil was taken by him with some other 20 pictures when he left France for Chile; now that big picture (345 × 272 cm) is in the Palacio Cousiño, in Santiago. An oil of the same composition in reverse, was sold at Gros & Delettrez 16 June 2014, lot 20, as attributed to Monvoisin. Another oil of the same composition and almost the same dimensions as the one sold in 2014 was sold at Sotheby's 29 April 2015, L15030; 16,875 GBP 

[1] Sotheby's Auction Notes: Charcoal on paper (visible area 545 x 420mm.), heightened with white, signed and dated lower right, mounted, framed and glazed. A fine drawing of Kira Vassiliki, a Greek Christian who became the influential wife of Ali Pasha. Vassiliki was born in 1789 in the village of Plisivitsa near Filiates and at the age of 12 sought an audience with Ali Pasha (1740-1822) to intercede for her father's life. Ali Pasha granted her father pardon and later married Vassiliki in 1808 and she joined his harem of over 600 women. Vassiliki was Ali Pasha’s favourite and was allowed to practice her Christian faith and used her influence over him to save the lives of many Greeks. When Ali Pasha was accused of treason and executed in 1822, Vassiliki was sent as a prisoner to the Sultan in Constantinople; he spared her life and she returned to Greece, where she lived until her death in 1834. 

[2] Dupré, Louis. Dupré, Louis. Ali. "Ali Tebelen, Pacha de Janina, dessiné d'aprés nature le 14 Mars sur le lac de Butrinto." Paris "Imprimerie de Dondey-Dupré, Rue St Louis, No 46, Au Marais." 1825-37 Coloured lithograph of Ali Pasha from Louis Dupré's " Voyage â Athènes et â Constantinople...". Original hand colour; verso blank; blind stamp of Dupré as issued. The famous image shows Ali seated in a boat, dressed in furs and smoking a chibouque. Ali despite his brutal history against the Suliotes is considered a hero of the Greek War of Independence; His rebellion against the Sublime Porte led in 1820, to an anti-Ottoman coalition, between Ali and the Suliotes, to which the Souliotes contributed 3,000 soldiers. Ali Pasha gained the support of the Souliotes mainly because he offered to allow the return of the Souliotes to their land, and partly by appeal to their perceived Albanian origin. 

Louis Dupré [1789-1837]. A pupil of Jacques-Louis David in Paris, Louis Dupré became resident in Rome and was appointed official painter to the prince Jerome Bonaparte, in 1811. In 1819, Louis Dupré took a six-month tour of Greece and Turkey, accompanied by three affluent English gentlemen, Messrs Hyett, Vivian, and Hay. He was received by the French consul Fauvel in Athens and introduced into Greek society allowing him to make his paintings of important personalities of the time, both in Athens and in Joannina where he portayed Ali Pascha, his family and attendants. He continued to Thessaly and from there he sailed to Constantinople, where he made the acquaintance of Prince Michael Soutzo of Moldavia with whom he returned to Italy via Romania. Upon arriving in Constantinople his companions left quickly, frightened by an outbreak of the plague. Dupré, however, remained and completed a series of watercolors. Nevertheless, the Englishmen funded Dupré's entire trip in exchange for these drawings, of which the artist also made duplicates that he exhibited at the Salon of 1824. His work " Voyage â Athènes et â Constantinople"was published in 10 livraisons, in Paris in 1825 through to 1837, consisting of 40 lithographs: portraits, costumes and views of Athenian antiquities, based upon these drawings. [Colnaghi of London pirated 2 of the portraits of Ali Pascha and published them before Dupré.]  MORE

Voyage à Athènes et à Constantinople by Louis Dupré

September 26, 2016, 10:03 am

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Reproduction available:

Hardcover from Bibliothèque des Introuvables (20 Jan. 2010) Language: French 
ISBN-10: 2845753128 
ISBN-13: 978-2845753129

Mavi Boncuk | 

Demetrios Mavromichalis

Louis Dupré's" Voyage à Athènes et à Constantinople "is a fascinating example of a travel book so contradictory it begs to be read against the grain. Taking the form of a costume album, it is based on notes and drawings made during the artist's voyage in the Ottoman Empire in 1819. However, the book was produced in France from 1825 to 1839, after the outbreak of Greek insurrections against Ottoman rule in 1821, a popular cause in France. This contextual gap between the moment of travel and the moment of production accounts for the work's contradictory aspects. It is overtly philhellenic, taking the side of the Greek rebels in their conflict with the Ottomans, seeing in the insurgence a revival of ancient ideals and culture. Yet key aspects of the work, particularly its costume images, tug against and undermine its underlying turcophobia and, ultimately, its nationalist, essentialist message of Hellenic regeneration. Dupré's colorful plates are striking and even hauntingly memorable, arresting the viewer's attention. His close-up depiction of boldly posed figures introduces an ambiguity into his travel account that belies its ideological frame. In particular, the costume images, resembling Ottoman-produced costume albums, implicitly celebrate a notion of empire-as-diversity that contradicts Dupré's nationalist text.

[Elizabeth Fraser, Ottoman Costume and Inclusive Empire: Louis Dupré in Ottoman Greece .Fashioning Identities symposium, Hunter College, NYC, October 2013]u
Colas 916; Lipperheide 1434; Droulia 901; Navari/ Blackmer: 517; Sotheby's/Blackmer 559. 360 by 252mm (14¼ by 10 inches).   ref: 2661  €2500

Moody's Moody Blues

September 26, 2016, 10:32 am

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Mavi Boncuk |
The Istanbul 100 stock index fell 3.8 percent and the national currency, the lira, also took a hit. The dollar was up 0.4 percent at 2.9796 lira.

The sell-off is largely due to Moody's statement late Friday that it was cutting Turkey's government debt rating to Ba1 from Baa3. The downgrade means Moody's joins Standard & Poor's in rating Turkey below investment grade. That's important because it will likely cost the government more to borrow on capital markets and prompt some investment funds to sell Turkish assets.

According to Moody's, Turkey's current account deficit remains elevated at 4.3 percent this year and 4 percent next and exceeds those of other similarly rated countries.

Moody's also cut its economic growth forecasts for Turkey to an annual average of 2.7 percent over the 2016-19 period compared with 5.5 percent over 2010-14.

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus dismissed the downgrade as a "political" move and part of a wider effort to undermine the country.

Kurtulmus said Turkey was determined to keep reforming the economy and to fight what he said were efforts to spread the "perception" that the country was in bad shape. He claimed that the outflow of funds following the downgrade has been limited.

Lee Hardman, a currency analyst at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, said the downgrade isn't likely to have too much of an impact given that investors continue to look for higher-yielding assets like Turkey's. Despite a series of cuts to interest rates, Turkey's main overnight marginal funding rate stands at 8.25 percent. In many developed economies, benchmark rates are near zero.

Rating Symbols and Definitions JULY 2016 
https://www.moodys.com/researchdocumentcontentpage.aspx?docid=PBC_79004
Moody’s Global Rating Scales

Rating Symbols

Gradations of creditworthiness are indicated by rating symbols, with each symbol representing a group in which the credit characteristics are broadly the same. There are nine symbols as shown below, from that used to designate least credit risk to that denoting greatest credit risk:

Aaa Aa A Baa Ba B Caa Ca C

Moody's appends numerical modifiers 1, 2, and 3 to each generic rating classification from Aa through Caa.

Baa Obligations rated Baa are judged to be medium-grade and subject to moderate credit risk and as
such may possess certain speculative characteristics.
Ba Obligations rated Ba are judged to be speculative and are subject to substantial credit risk.
B Obligations rated B are considered speculative and are subject to high credit risk

Moody’s appends numerical modifiers 1, 2, and 3 to each generic rating classification from Aa through Caa. The
modifier 1 indicates that the obligation ranks in the higher end of its generic rating category; the modifier 2 indicates a
mid-range ranking; and the modifier 3 indicates a ranking in the lower end of that generic rating category

Pera | Viktor Burgeni

September 26, 2016, 3:08 pm

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Burgeni Beyoğlu'nda Doğru (Grand Rue) yol'da numara 376. En zarif ve şık potinler satan işbu mağazada Amerika ve Fransa'nın nefis malları mevcuttur. Kadın - erkek - çocuk ayakkabıları yazlık en son moda ayakkabıları' Servet-i Fünun, 25 Haziran 1908

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September 2016 | Levantine Conference

September 26, 2016, 3:15 pm

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Mavi Boncuk | ‘The Effects and Contributions of Levantines in the development of Beyoğlu / Pera and Galata Neighbourhoods: A long heritage of Trade, Culture and Arts since 1453’ Friday 23 – Sunday 25th September 2016, Beyoğlu, Istanbul 

Organised by the Levantine Heritage Foundation with the support of the Municipality of Beyoğlu Invitation to provide support – sponsorship of side events, accommodation for visiting delegates, duties before and during the conference Beyoğlu known by the minorities as ‘Pera’, developed as a neighbourhood from the Middle Ages as the extension of the former Genoese trade colony of Galata. As Galata couldn’t contain the growing number of Embassies from the 17th century onwards these were relocated in Beyoğlu and built in architecture to reflect the importance of the various emerging empire nations of the day. 

These building now serve the respective nations consulates. The same trend of movement was also followed by the Levantines, resident foreigners and minorities and by the 19th century the ‘Grande Rue de Pera’ became the showcase of the Ottoman Empire, where trade, culture, arts flourished in the ‘La Belle Époque’. Today the grandeur is not completely lost, the buildings stand, the thoroughfare is still a magnet for shoppers and the area still has a distinctive part-foreign feel. The conference aims to analyse and celebrate the long and varied contribution Levantines and their businesses have had in shaping this neighbourhood and beyond. 


 Levantine Conference Booklet

See The Catoni Group

The 53rd International Antalya Film Festival

September 28, 2016, 6:31 am

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Mavi Boncuk |

The  53rd International Antalya Film Festival, scheduled to take place Oct. 16-23, continues to initiate new projects and empower Turkish cinema. 


The Antalya Film Festival previously known as Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival (Turkish: Antalya Altın Portakal Film Festivali) is a film festival, held annually since 1963 in Antalya, is the most important film festival in Turkey. Since 2009, the event, which takes place in the autumn months at the Antalya Cultural Center (Antalya Kültür Merkezi, AKM), has been organised solely by the Antalya Foundation for Culture and Arts (Antalya Kültür Sanat Vakfı, AKSAV) and has included an international section within the main body of the festival. 

The  53rd International Antalya Film Festival 
National Featue Film Competition

ALBÜM / Mehmet Can Mertoğlu debut film 
BABAMIN KANATLARI / Kıvanç Sezer debut film 
EŞİK / Ayhan Salar debut film 
GENÇ PEHLİVANLAR / Mete Gümürhan debut film 
MAVİ BİSİKLET / Ümit Köreken debut film 
ORHAN PAMUK’A SÖYLEMEYİN KARS’TA ÇEKTİĞİM FİLMDE KAR 
ROMANI DA VAR / Rıza Sönmez debut film 
RAUF / Barış Kaya- Soner Caner debut film 
TOZ / Gözde Kural debut film
RÜYA / Derviş Zaim 
RÜZGARDA SALINAN NİLÜFER / Seren Yüce 
SİYAH KARGA / Tayfur Aydın 
TEREDDÜT / Yeşim Ustaoğlu 

Film Talent Marketing Rounds (FILM TMR), introduced to the public by Antalya. This new platform helps enable the Turkish film industry in terms of communications and commercial activities. FILM TMR aims to help Turkish films to reach out to people around the world via TV distributors and online film buyers.

FILM TMR is open to all completed films, independent from the festival selection. The new platform will bring film distributors, TV buyers, online film distributors and all buyers of international film festivals together to watch all Turkish films shot after January 2015. 

FILM TMR began to take final shape during last year's festival and in meetings that took place throughout the year. The newly initiated platform takes place Oct. 16-23 at the Glass Pyramid, which is the new center of the festival. All Turkish productions shot after January 2015 can apply online to become a part of FILM TMR until Sept. 29.


Recently, the festival has revealed its highly anticipated festival poster and announced that Gérard Depardieu, one of the most beloved and respected actors in contemporary cinema, will attend the festival as a special guest. In addition, the Golden Orange Award will be given to the two legendary names of Turkish Cinema, actor Yılmaz Gruda and director Feyzi Tuna. Dubbing artists Altan Karındaş and Toron Karacoğlu will receive Golden Orange Labor Award, while Emel Sayın will receiving this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

Cold of Kalandar for 89th Academy Awards

September 28, 2016, 6:34 am

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Mavi Boncuk |

The award-winning film "Kalandar Soğuğu" (Cold of Kalandar) will be Turkey's submission for this year's 89th Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Language Film category.
The winner will be selected from among five entries for best foreign-language film which are narrowed down from nine and evaluated by the Foreign Language Film Award Committee.
The film which hit Turkish theaters on Sept. 16 tells the story of a family who lives in a mountain village near the Black Sea where they try to hold on to life.

Starring Haydar Şişman, Nuray Yeşilaraz, Hanife Kara and İbrahim Kuvvet, "Kalandar Soğuğu" (Cold of Kalandar) is directed by Mustafa Kara.

"We wanted to portray the drama of the story while also capturing the natural environment of the Black Sea region, which is not something typically covered in Turkish film. Therefore we chased this ambition and shot the film during four seasons," Kara said about the film.

Written by director Kara and Bilal Sert, the Turkish production premiered at the Tokyo Film Festival and won the awards for Best Director and Best Film.

"Cold of Kalandar" also won many other awards, including the Special Jury Award at Premier Plans D'angers in France and the award for Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Music and Special Jury Awards at the Antalya Film Festival, followed by Best Director, Best Actor, Best Cinematographer and Best Fiction awards at the Istanbul Film Festival, and Best Director at the Red Tulip Film Festival in the Netherlands.

Turkey, which has been submitting films for the Oscars on a regular basis since 1989


Cold of Kalandar' ('Kalandar Sogugu'): Istanbul Review
10:32 AM PDT 4/25/2016 by Jonathan Holland

Mustafa Kara’s intense rural drama about a Turkish family’s struggles against adversity took four awards at the recent Istanbul festival.
If a single line of dialogue could be said to summarize the theme and mood of the powerful, slow-burning and beautifully-hewn rural drama Cold of Kalandar, it would be: “Daddy, I am collecting snails to sell in town to buy a pair of trousers.” This surreal, slow-moving tale of poverty, persistence and potential redemption set in the mountains of Northern Turkey is heavily symbolic fare and beautifully shot, but it works as tightly focused drama, too, if you can engage with the driven fantasies of the wonderfully played hero and absorb the often over-leisurely pacing. Director Mustafa Kara wishes to convey this particular struggle in all its painful physicality, and the slowness of change is itself part of that struggle.

Festivals have been receiving Cold of Kalandar with warmth, and should continue to recognize its cinematic qualities as the recent Istanbul festival did, where it took best director as well as actor, photography and editing honors.

Mehmet (Haydar Sisman, omnipresent and a worthy winner of best actor for this performance at the Istanbul fest) once made a little money by finding a seam of gold in the mountains where he lives in a dilapidated hut with his long-suffering wife Hanife (Nuray Yesilaraz, also strong), their two sons, Ibrahim (Ibrahim Kuvvet) and Mustafa (Temel Kara, with disabilities), his mother-in-law and a few animals, including a bull. To the despair of Hanife, Mehmet continues to roam the mountains for days at a time in search of minerals for potential exploitation by a nearby mine. This is the dream he has made for himself and his family; the rest of us go to football games.

But his luck is bad: The family has debts, and Mehmet’s wanderings have made him a local laughing stock. “I work like hell, but we’re destitute,” complains Hanife, and indeed she is as much of a beast of burden as any of the animals. When the snows come, making it impossible for him to continue prospecting, Mehmet again decides to take up a different dream by transforming the bull he was going to sell at the market into a fighting bull, and sets about training it.

Brief scenes of dialogue are interspersed with lengthy scenes of people, mostly the family, just being and doing. For many viewers, there will be just too much of this, but it’s probably part of Kara’s logic that a film about the slow grind of everyday survival and the one man’s slow inner resistance is hardly going to play out like The Bourne Supremacy.

The longest of the dialogues comes at mid-point, when Mehmet challenges Hanife about her continual negativity towards him, otherwise known as nagging. Although the speakers are two rural Turks in a hovel, the raw content of their words has resonance for plenty of modern relationships. Their conversation moves cleverly and grippingly through a range of moods, showing that the director can handle true, raw emotion as well; after that key conversation, something subtle changes in the film, and a little light and warmth are allowed to enter.

Cunning editing by Umut Sakallioglu, Ali Aga and Mustafa Kara creates moments of mini tension: For example, one shot of a rock falling down a mountain is followed by one of Mehmet walking up, suggesting his vulnerability. It is an index of the quality of Sisman’s performance  that the viewer becomes increasingly aware of the nobility below the surface of a man who is at first sight both pathetic and vulnerable, and who is more remarkable than he can know.

The film was shot over four seasons, and it is these which determine the pace and the mood — there is the sense that behind the tale of Mehmet’s poverty and persistence, Kara is capturing for us a documentary record of one family’s (completely electricity-free) survival in brutal natural conditions. (Seeing Mehmet cut off a part of his shoe in a frozen cave to make kindling for a fire is worthy of the physical extremities suffered in The Revenant — except that this is now.)

The camerawork of Cevahir Sahin and Kursat Uresin is both celebratory and respectful of the natural world, whether in stunning, screen-filling long shots of Mehmet struggling up mountains above the cloud line or in close-ups of snails or of the ever so slightly mad eyes of the protagonist. Beauty and danger are eked out in equal measure from the texture of rocks, water, snow and metal. Matters build up to a powerful, haunting final sequence in the mist, in which the family are temporarily lost to one another, but which contains the seeds of their possible redemption.

Production companies: Karafilm Productions, Katapult Film
Cast: Haydar Sisman, Nuray Yesirelaraz, Hanife Kara, Ibrahim Kuvvet, Temel Kara
Director: Mustafa Kara
Screenwriter: Mustafa Kara, Bilal Sert
Producer: Nermin Aytekin
Directors of photography: Cevahir Sahin, Kursat Uresin
Production designer: Olgun Kara
Editor: Umut Sakallioglu, Ali Aga, Mustafa Kara
Composer: Eleonore Fourniau
Sales: Karafilm Productions


Not rated, 139 minutes

In Memoriam | Shimon Peres (1923-2016)

September 28, 2016, 8:45 am

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Following a massive stroke, Peres died after two weeks of hospitalization at the Sheba medical center near Tel-Aviv on 28 September 2016.

"If a problem has no solution, it may not be a problem, but a fact - not to be solved, but to be coped with over time." Shimon Peres[1] (1923-2016)

Peres' foreign policy outlook was markedly realist and Peres allegedly downplayed the Armenian genocide. Peres stated: "We reject attempts to create a similarity between the Holocaust and the Armenian allegations. Nothing similar to the Holocaust occurred. It is a tragedy what the Armenians went through but not a genocide." Although Peres himself did not retract the statement, the Israeli Foreign Ministry later issued a cable to its missions which stated that "The minister absolutely did not say, as the Turkish news agency alleged, 'What the Armenians underwent was a tragedy, not a genocide.'"However, according to Armenian news agencies, the statement released by the Israeli consulate in Los Angeles did not include any mention that Peres had not said that the events were not genocide.


See also: Recep Erdogan storms out of Davos  after clash with Israeli president over Gaza.  

Mavi Boncuk | 


Dennis Ross[2] Reflects on Peres, the Strategic Thinker
Jerusalem Post | September 28, 2016

[1] Shimon Peres born Szymon Perski; 2 August 1923 – 28 September 2016) was a Polish-born Israeli statesman. He was the ninth President of Israel, serving from 2007 to 2014. Peres served twice as the Prime Minister of Israel and twice as Interim Prime Minister, and he was a member of 12 cabinets in a political career spanning over 66 years.Peres was elected to the Knesset in November 1959 and, except for a three-month-long hiatus in early 2006, served continuously until 2007, when he became President, serving in the role for another 7 years. 

At the time of his retirement in 2014, he was the world's oldest head of state. He was considered the last link to Israel's founding generation. From a young age, he was renowned for his oratorical brilliance. He began his over 66 year-long political career, holding several diplomatic and military positions during and directly after Israel's War of Independence. His first high-level government position was as Deputy Director-General of Defense in 1952 which he attained at the age of 28, and Director-General from 1953 until 1959. 

In the 1950s, he took part in negotiations on the Protocol of Sèvres described by British Prime Minister Anthony Eden as the "highest form of statesmanship."[6] Peres won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize together with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat for the peace talks that he participated in as Israeli Foreign Minister, producing the Oslo Accords.

During his career, he represented five political parties in the Knesset: Mapai, Rafi, the Alignment, Labor and Kadima, and led Alignment and Labor. In his private life, he was an amateur poet, writing stanzas during cabinet meetings, some of which would later be turned into songs. 

 [2] Dennis RossWilliam Davidson Distinguished Fellow | Counselor | Irwin Levy Family Program on the U.S.-Israel Strategic Relationship

America's Anxious Allies: Trip Report From Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Israel

September 28, 2016, 11:01 am

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Mavi Boncuk | 
America's Anxious Allies: Trip Report From Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Israel

Featuring Meghan O'Sullivan, Philip Gordon, Dennis Ross, and James F. Jeffrey PolicyWatch 2696 September 28, 2016 

Read this item online.

On September 26, The Washington Institute held a Policy Forum with Meghan O'Sullivan, Philip Gordon, Dennis Ross, and James Jeffrey, who recently returned from a bipartisan tour of key U.S. allies. O'Sullivan is the Jeane Kirkpatrick Professor at Harvard's Kennedy School and former special assistant to the president for Iraq and Afghanistan. Gordon is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and former White House coordinator for the Middle East, North Africa, and the Gulf region. Ross is the Institute's counselor and William Davidson Distinguished Fellow and served in senior policymaking positions during several U.S. administrations. Jeffrey is the Institute's Philip Solondz Distinguished Fellow and former ambassador to Iraq and Turkey. The following is a rapporteur's summary of their remarks.

MEGHAN O'SULLIVAN

When talking about Saudi Arabia today, most observers fall into one of two general categories. The first are people who have not been there in a while -- they tend to focus on the kingdom's enormous demographic and economic challenges, along with the issue of transferring power to the next generation. In contrast, people who have been there recently tend to walk away impressed and surprised by the energy, sense of purpose, and sense of possibility the kingdom exudes -- a change witnessed in just the past couple years. 

This is an important economic moment because Saudi leaders are well aware that ongoing structural changes in the oil market could prevent new price spikes, which means they need to transform to survive. Prince Muhammad bin Salman's consolidation of power is impressive, as is the team of people he has galvanized to work on these challenges. Almost every conversation during the latest visit began with talk of the internal transformation plan called "Vision 2030." It is a highly ambitious plan, but the Saudis appreciate the dire moment and the need to tackle tough issues.

That includes transforming social and political life along with the economy. As one of our interlocutors said, "This is revolution disguised as economic reform." Such acknowledgements are very encouraging, though internal debate continues over the speed of those changes and the possibility of altering the social contract. In general, officials are interested in moving away from oil but realistic about the kingdom's medium-term dependency.

Changes in the role of religion seem to be happening as well. Saudi leaders want to move the state project from ideological to national development, though they have not offered much specificity on steps beyond neutering the religious police over the past six months. 

Elsewhere, Turkey is prioritizing efforts to preserve a unified, centralized Syria, despite the consensus that this goal will be difficult to achieve. Turkish officials also see the Iraqi and Syrian Kurds quite differently. And while the next U.S. president may wish to push back on Turkey's ongoing post-coup purges, Washington will not be heard on that issue unless it is sympathetic to Ankara's concerns about Fethullah Gulen and his opposition movement.

PHILIP GORDON

Saudi Arabia has a clear sense of purpose. Although it has tried economic reform before, it now has a group of young, dynamic former private-sector workers with a vision and determination to genuinely transform the country. There is a defined path forward, which gives reason for optimism. 

At the same time, Saudi leaders will encounter resistance as their people begin to work, pay taxes, and live without subsidies for the first time. Succession issues could also arise within the royal family. The United States has an interest in their success and should support them; Washington cannot get overly cynical, complaining about the lack of change but not backing it when the Saudis actually try it. 

Riyadh's foreign policy inspires less optimism. The Saudis are convinced that they are in a sectarian geopolitical struggle with Iran and are committed to pursuing it. This means they will continue funding the wars in Syria and Yemen despite the negative consequences at home and abroad. 

In Turkey, Americans underestimate how traumatic and significant this summer's attempted coup was. The parliament was bombed and Gulenists infiltrated the system, leaving conservatives and secularists/liberals alike in fear of the dangers posed by that movement. Yet the United States still tends to downplay the coup, leaving many Turks feeling betrayed. At the same time, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is clearly overreaching in his domestic response to the coup. Going forward, Washington needs to address the impression that it does not care about the Gulen extradition request. It should also communicate with Ankara on how to deal with the Islamic State cooperatively while minimizing reliance on the Syrian Kurds

The tour stop in Israel revealed disparate views on many key issues. The Iran deal has faded as a central topic of conversation. And while recent developments in relations with Arab states are significant, they may mean less in diplomatic terms than Israelis hope (i.e., as far as recognizing Israel's existence and making progress on the Palestinian issue). Israelis are also torn on Syria. In their view, both of the most likely scenarios -- post-Assad chaos or continued control by Assad and his Hezbollah partner -- seem equally threatening.

More broadly, when partners and friends talk about the need for U.S. leadership, they are really talking about what they want the United States to do. At the moment, they have high expectations that the next administration will act in ways more favorable to them. Yet the next president may have trouble meeting that expectation, since the Obama administration has already tried to offer reassurance through major arms and technology transfers.

DENNIS ROSS

Dispatching a bipartisan team to the Middle East sent a good message to key allies: namely, that U.S. experts and former officials on both sides of the aisle can travel as a group and broadly agree that American leadership and engagement in the region are important. Some of the participants might play roles in the next administration, so their presence and their willingness to talk to regional leaders about local priorities and ideas signaled that America values these bilateral relationships. 

Saudi Arabia was especially exciting because it shows signs of trying to become a successful model of modern Arab economic state development. The way the Saudis do business -- in terms of candor, punctuality, and hours worked -- is better than it has been in the past. They are also taking extremism seriously and want to educate their population in order to discredit the Islamic State and other radical actors.

In Turkey, the preoccupation with Gulen remains potent. For most Turks, an outright American refusal to turn him over would be akin to Ankara having custody of Osama bin Laden after 9 /11 and refusing to hand him over to Washington. U.S. officials need to understand that psychology if they hope to deal with the problem.

In Israel, leaders made clear that they do not want to become a binational state. How they plan to avoid that scenario is less certain, but they believe a regional framework is possible -- one that takes advantage of improved Arab-Israeli relations in such a way that Arab states give diplomatic cover to Palestinians and rewards to Israel. Yet Arab governments may not have enough interest or bandwidth to facilitate such progress, and even if they do, it won't happen on the cheap -- Israel would still need to make major concessions. Accordingly, the United States should focus on restoring a sense of possibility for a two-state solution.

To address allies' broader concerns, the next administration could implement policies that seek to contain Iran's militia and destabilization activities, developing contingency plans with allied governments to better deal with that challenge. This would also give Washington more leverage to ask things of them. In addition, U.S. officials can help the Saudis with issues related to their reforms, such as technical assistance on initial public offerings. Finally, the next administration should invite the Israeli prime minister to Camp David for a strategic dialogue early on. 

JAMES JEFFREY

At each stop on the tour, interlocutors said that the Middle East is at a new level of chaos and uncertainty. They were particularly concerned about Iran and Russia. At the same time, Saudi, Turkish, and Israeli officials all expressed a certain optimism that they were in good shape despite the regional problems -- an encouraging sign. All three are projecting military force in their neighborhoods in an unprecedented way in terms of intelligence sharing and other activities. This may be burden sharing, but America is used to gathering everyone under its banner, and these partners are willing and ready to work with Washington. 

For Turks, the Gulenist coup attempt was like their 9/11 -- a real shock. They witnessed the military take up arms against itself and fire heavy weapons against its own people. The good news is that they uniformly view the coup's failure as a fortunate result. Another consequence is that President Erdogan has emerged from the incident even more powerful, though the population is still split between supporting and opposing him, which could be a problem depending on how he wants to use his current popularity. Whatever the case, the Gulen extradition request could be a long-term bilateral issue.

This summary was prepared by Mitchel Hochberg.

Le poirier sauvage by Nuri Bilge Ceylan for Arte France Cinéma

September 28, 2016, 1:33 pm

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Mavi Boncuk |
The third selection committee of 2016 for Arte France Cinéma (headed up by Olivier Père) has chosen to co-produce and pre-purchase five projects[1]. 

They include Le poirier sauvage (Ahlat agaci|Wild Pear)[2] by Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan, who won the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2014 with Winter Sleep and has won several other awards at Cannes (the Grand Prix in 2003 and 2011 with Uzak and Once Upon a Time in Anatolia respectively, and the award for Best Director in 2008 with Three Monkeys . His next film will centre around Sinan, who is passionate about literature and has always wanted to be a writer. Returning to the village where he was born, he pours his heart and soul into scraping together the money he needs to be published, but his father’s debts catch up with him… Commenting on the plot, Nuri Bilge Ceylan says: "Whether we like it or not, we can’t help but inherit certain defining features from our fathers, like a certain number of their weaknesses, their habits, their mannerisms and much, much more. The story of a son’s unavoidable slide towards a fate resembling that of his father is told here through a series of painful experiences." Le poirier sauvage will be produced by Parisian company (and Winter Sleep partner) Memento Films Production[3] and Turkish company Zeyno Film.  SOURCE

“Whether we like it or not, we can’t help but inherit certain defining features from our fathers, like a certain number of their weaknesses, their habits, their mannerisms and much, much more. The story of a son’s unavoidable slide towards a fate resembling that of his father is told here through a series of painful experiences,” Ceylan says. 



[1] 
Maya by Mia Hansen-Love
Mademoiselle de Joncquières by Emmanuel Mouret
La prière by Cédric Kahn
La Cordillera by Santiago Mitre

For the record, Arte France Cinéma will most notably be supporting upcoming films by Philippe Faucon, Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, Philippe Garrel, Andreï Zviaguintsev, Sergeï Loznitsa, Nadav Lapid, Thierry de Peretti, Serge Bozon, Hafsia Herzi, Rayhana Obermeyer, Fellipe Barbosa, Samuel Maoz, Karim Moussaoui, Dror Moreh, the duo Agnès Varda - JR, and Michel Ocelot.

[2] Pyrus pyraster, also called European wild pear, is a species of pear belonging to the Rosaceae family. This wild pear and Pyrus caucasica are thought to be the ancestors of the cultivated European pear. 

Widely found in Asia Minor the pear of the tree has been called argun, alfat, banda, çakal armudu, çördük, çövür, dığdığı, dızdığı, haliç, kerte, kohoz, gelinboğan, panta, üngülüz, zingit, ahlata in Turkish.

[3] Memento Films Production 40 rue de Paradis 75010 Paris tel: +33 1 47 70 19 99 fax: +33 1 47 70 21 22

Oriental Carpets | Cardinal & Harford

September 28, 2016, 2:23 pm

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Mavi Boncuk |

23 April 1923, 100 Cumulative Participating Preference Shares á £ 1, #76, 27.6 x 31.5 cm, blue, red, folds, very decorative. 23.04.1923, 100 Cumulative Participating Preference Shares á £ 1, #76, 27,6 x 31,5 cm, blau, rot, Knickfalten, hochdekorativ.

 The company was founded in 1922 to take over the existing business of Cardinal & Harford Ltd[1]. which was a manufacturer for oriental carpets and rugs. The new company was controlled by Isaac Behar [2]who came from Istanbul. He established a successful business importing carpets from India, Afghanistan, Persia and Turkey.


1901 Trade Ad from an old Architectural Journal publication 

See also OCR text of: Turkey Carpets and their Manufacture A SKETCH. WITH ‘PHOTOGRAPHS. PRINTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION. CARDINAL & HARFORD, LEVANT WAREHOUSE, I08, HIGH HOLBORN, LONDON.

[1] "The oldest Levantine company to set up shop carpet weaving in Uşak was ‘

Article : Breslin Brothers (FRIES-BRESLIN CO., MANUFACTURERS OF SMYRNA Carpets, Rugs, Mats. MILLS: FERRY ROAD, CAMDEN, N. J) "October 4, 1904, New York Times, p. 2 Losses by Fire Camden, NJ, Oct 3. Fire today destroyed the extensive rug factory of the Fries-Breslin Company entailing a loss estimated at $400,000. The factory was a large four-story building. A large amount of finished goods and a great quantity of raw material were stored in the structure. There was an insurance of $825,000 on the building and contents. " 

[1] Cardinal & Harford’ a Levantine family from Smyrna who started in this trade when a London based company decides to leave the carpet trade and offers to sell them the business. Answer: In earlier times Europeans through their local intermediaries would buy up the ready-made existing stock in the Uşak market. According to my research Cardinal & Harford was the first European firm to commission carpets according to their own designs and custom colours. In 1792 the company was bought by a Smyrna Levantine firm and start to operate their own carpet weaving centres in Uşak, Kula, Demirci and Gördes. The designs were clearly taken from different Turkish and Eastern carpets but were able to incorporate these to the quality in Uşak, adding many colours to it, and thus making them appealing to the European middle class which at the time was growing in prosperity. The 16-18th century Uşak classical period carpets were thin and long with no size standard applied. This company brought in European size standards to their production: 8’x10’; 9’x12’; 10’x14’. They introduced new colour tones that didn’t really exist in the old Uşak carpets, beiges, light greens, different brown tones and lilac. They were able to get the locals accept their English manner of trade practices. For example each colour, each order having a code number and being tracked by that number and precise following of the carpet dimensions....There was a Christian minority in Uşak but the Levantines lived there for a short period. Some of these Levantines were managers of the local branch of the Ottoman Bank and some were technicians who operated the dye-houses belonging to the Levantine firms. The locals of Uşak learnt how to use synthetic dyes from these specialists. The number of resident Levantines varied with time but I estimate it didn’t exceed 8-10 families, around 30 people. There was a French School in Uşak but it was more geared towards a Catholic mission aimed at the local Christians. The aim was to train personel for their railway line that ran from Smyrna...The exodus of the Levantines of Smyrna brought all of the carpet trade of Western Anatolia almost to the point of elimination. This was because the distribution network had collapsed. All of Turkey was razed and ravaged and no local had any capital. The newly established Turkish state took some minor steps but to no avail. 
Interview with Sadık Uşaklıgil, January 2016

[2] Victor Behar, carpet manufacturer and retailer. Isaac Behar (he preferred to be known as Victor) came from Istanbul in Turkey and set up in business in Sauchiehall Street c 1900 as a supplier of oriental carpets, rugs and other articles of furniture. He established a successful business with a reputation for high quality, importing carpets and rugs from India, Afghanistan, Persia and Turkey. V Behar & Co was the original manufacturer of the Raheb Turkish Pile Carpet, made in Scotland from imported materials. The company employed skilled craftsmen and women from eastern countries to repair and reweave damaged carpets. The business expanded through the acquisition of the long-established London firm, Cardinal & Harford, and after the First World War bought a massive German owned carpet factory in Tabriz, Persia. Behar also had interests in India and Turkey as chairman of The Indian Carpet Manufacturers, and director of The Levant Carpet Manufacturers. Today, Behar Carpets claims to be Scotland's leading retailer of carpets and flooring products, with a network of fifteen stores throughout Scotland. 

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Big, Big World Awarded in Adana Film Festival

September 30, 2016, 10:43 am

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Mavi Boncuk |

The latest drama by award-winning Turkish writer-director Reha Erdem, Big, Big, World (Koca Dunya), received the best film prize Saturday at the International Adana Film Festival.

It is Erdem’s tenth feature-length film and centers on the story of an orphan brother and sister who are set to enter the real world.

“Ali and Zuhal take their first step into this big world committing a crime and it becomes impossible for them to live among people. A boy and a girl that were thrown out of the civilized world would live the entire human story from scratch,” according to the movie’s plot.

Big, Big, World also received the Special Jury Prize at the Venice International Film Festival earlier on September.

The 23rd edition of the Turkish festival took place in the southern province of Adana.

Winners include:

Best Director: Mehmet Can Mertoglu, Album
Best Screenplay: Mehmet Can Mertoglu, Album
Best Actress: Gizen Erdem, Ruya
Tarik Akan Best Actor: Menderes Samancilar, Babamin Kanatlari
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Article | Erdogan Faces a Choice Between Popularity and Power

October 3, 2016, 8:56 am

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Mavi Boncuk |

Erdogan Faces a Choice Between Popularity and Power

James F. Jeffrey
Financial Times
September 28, 2016

Although continuing the crackdown would be the quicker and more expedient approach to meeting Erdogan's goals, it is also more dangerous, risking a permanent state of cultural civil war.

Some two months after the attempted overthrow of its government by rogue military commanders, Turkey faces a choice in its political development. Had the coup succeeded, the country would probably have plunged into civil war. But a popular uprising, urged on via a FaceTime video by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, overcame the revolt in its first few hours. The quashing of the putschists generated a rare sense of unity among Turks.

Mr Erdogan, who leads the conservative Justice and Development Party and has been in power since 2003 as prime minister and then president, emerged the winner of the night, with a big increase in both his personal power and popularity. Having put in place a three-month, post-coup state of emergency, his popular support increased from a usual 40-50 per cent to 68 per cent in one Turkish poll.

On the international front, Mr Erdogan has recently patched up relations with Israel and Russia -- damaged respectively after Israel's raid on the Gaza aid flotilla in 2010 and the shooting down of the Russian military plane in 2015. He has supported moves towards reunification of Cyprus and intervened on the ground in Syria to deter all three of Ankara's foes there -- Isis, the Assad regime and the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD). While the PYD is allied with the US against Isis, it is also closely linked to the Turkish Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has led insurgencies in Turkey and is considered a terrorist group by Ankara and the US. The refugee deal so critical to Europe is holding and the Turkish economy, while slowing, is on an even keel.

The main beneficiary has been Mr Erdogan himself. He can choose between two futures: one oriented towards his popularity, the other towards his power. His choice will shape Turkey and the entire south-east European and Middle Eastern regions.

Opting for popularity -- and the political security that sustained popular support brings -- could result in a return to Mr Erdogan's reformist early years as prime minister. It might signify more of the kind of overtures to PKK rebels he made before 2015. It could also mean less of a "winner-take-all" spirit in dealing with his political opposition and a curtailment of extrajudicial hounding of alleged supporters of the Islamist cleric Fethullah Gulen, who most Turks now believe masterminded the coup. Such an approach could advance Mr Erdogan's aim to create a "presidential state" -- gaining, through constitutional amendments, enhanced powers similar to those of a French president.

The second way, however, to achieve this ambition is through the exploitation of his post-coup power over state and society, a level of control unseen in Turkey since the Republic's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. No institution -- neither the army, the Gulenists, the media, the political opposition nor the judiciary -- can now halt a move towards a democratically sanctioned, de facto dictatorship.

In this context, Mr Erdogan could expand the fight against the PKK, extend the state of emergency and ban parliamentarians from the pro-Kurdish Democratic People's Party. He could obtain the parliamentary super majority he needs to amend the constitution through an alliance with the strongly nationalist, anti-Kurd Nationalist Action Party.

This path is the quicker and more expedient. It is also more dangerous, pitting Turkey's Kurds, Alevis (a large heterogeneous Shia minority) and west-oriented "secularists" against Mr Erdogan's nationalist religious alliance in a permanent cultural civil war. Vladimir Putin's leadership is the model here but Russia has fewer cultural divisions. In the long term, Turkey cannot prosper in an integrated global economy while it is in the midst of a cultural and political civil war with ever more restrictions on liberty.

The west has a stake, given Turkey's geopolitical importance and the disorder in the region. The west also has leverage but it is limited. With Syria burning and new refugee flows looming, Europe and the US need Mr Erdogan now as much as he needs them. And he reacts notoriously badly to pressure from the outside.

Nevertheless, finding common ground with Turkey on security, diplomatic and economic issues eventually could build trust of the kind that existed between Mr Erdogan and Barack Obama during the US president's first term.

That is no guarantee of a gentler Mr Erdogan. But he will want to hedge his bets; flaunting a proud independence from the west without burning bridges to it. The right approach by the west could help him find such a middle path. It could include better co-ordination between Washington and Ankara on operations in Syria, a good faith US response to the request for Mr Gulen's extradition and EU adherence to the refugee accord.

James Jeffrey is the Philip Solondz Distinguished Fellow at The Washington Institute and former US ambassador to Turkey.

Holstein Papers, Balkan Rail, Deutsche Bank

October 3, 2016, 8:56 am

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Bleichröder; drawing by David Levine SOURCE

Mavi Boncuk | from The Holstein[1] Papers. Gerson von Bleichröder[2] arranged  Hirsch[3] shares to be transfered to Deutsche Bank in 1886

See also: Turkenhirsch[4]: A Study of Baron Maurice De Hirsch (English edition translated from original Hebrew text. It has mostly secondary sources. MAM)


The Chemins de fer Orientaux (English: Oriental Railway; Turkish: Rumeli Demiryolu or İstanbul-Viyana Demiryolu) (reporting mark: CO) was an Ottoman railway company operating in Rumelia (the European part of the Ottoman Empire, corresponding to the Balkan peninsula) and later European Turkey, from 1870 to 1937. The CO was one of the five pioneer railways in the Ottoman Empire and built the main trunk line in the Balkans. Between 1889 and 1937, the railway hosted the world-famous Orient Express.

The railway was charted in 1870 to build a line from Istanbul to Vienna. Because of many political problems in the Balkans, construction started and stopped and ownership changed or split often. Not until 1888 did the CO complete its objective, but after the First Balkan War in 1912, the railway was limited to only Eastern Thrace. The CO continued operations as a regional railway until 1937, when the Turkish State Railways absorbed it.

Construction of the line was well underway by 1871. Following a government change the same year, the new Grand Vizier Mahmud Nedim Pasha started to renegotiate the concession to reduce the budget of constructing the line because of the Empire's growing financial problems. The new concession no longer had completion to Vienna as a priority and was signed on 18 May, 1872. Under the new agreement, Hirsch would continue to manage ongoing construction, but the Ottoman government would supervise in building new lines.

The full Constantinople–Vienna main line was opened on 12 August 1888. The CO, along with the Hungarian State Railways and the Bulgarian State Railways - BDZ, inaugurated the first train from İstanbul to Vienna. One of the most famous trains in history, the Orient Express, started her first run from Paris to İstanbul on 1 June 1889. This train was operated by CIWL, an international hotel and logistics company. A railway terminus on the European side of İstanbul, İstanbul Sirkeci Terminal, which was under construction since February 1888, was opened on 3 November 1890. 

[1] Friedrich August Karl Ferdinand Julius von Holstein (April 24, 1837 – May 8, 1909) was a civil servant of the German Empire and served as the head of the political department of the German Foreign Office for more than thirty years. He played a major role in shaping foreign policy after Bismarck was dismissed in 1890.

See: The Holstein Papers. Vol. I. Memoirs and Political Observations, edited by Norman Rich and M. H. Fisher (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1955); The Holstein Papers. Vol. 3 (1961)

[2] Gerson von Bleichröder (22 December 1822 – 18 February 1893) was a Jewish German banker. The bank maintained close contacts with the Rothschild family; the banking house of Bleichröder acted as a branch office in Berlin of the Rothschilds' bank. Traditionally, the Rothschilds represented the banking interests of the Austrian-controlled German Confederation in Europe. In the conflict between the rapidly rising and expanding nation of Prussia and the "pro-Austrian" German Confederation, the Rothschild Bank was largely caught in an uncomfortable position in the middle of the conflict. 

"Yet even Bismarck treated Bleichröder as a Hausjude when he came to write his memoirs. There is no mention of Bleichröder in the two volumes of memoirs which were published during Bismarck’s lifetime and only a single casual one in the volume published after his death. Nor did the editors of Bismarck’s letters include any to Bleichröder. It seemed that Bleichröder’s story could never be told. Now rich sources have been revealed. The private archives of the family firm found a refuge in New York. They contain thousands of letters to Bleichröder throughout his career—letters from William I and Leopold II, from German ministers and officials, from the Rothschilds, from Disraeli, and from countless political informants. There were also letters from Bismarck’s wife, from his sons and from his secretaries. Bismarck preferred to communicate his views and wishes only in conversation."  SOURCE

[3] Baron Maurice von Hirsch auf Gereuth (1831-1896), a Jewish-German financier and philanthropist dedicated his fortune to the welfare of Eastern European Jews at a time when worsening conditions in Russia made mass emigration a necessity. Hirsch's estate, estimated at $100 million by 1890, resulted from his pioneer enterprises in the sugar and copper industries and management of the Turkish railway, which linked Constantinople to Europe. 

 [4] Turkenhirsch: A Study of Baron Maurice De Hirsch Kurt Grunwald | Transaction Publishers, Jan 1, 1966 - History - 158 pages 

Who was "'Turkenhirsch'"whose death, eighty years ago on April 20, 1896, made headlines in newspapers all over the world? Few people today remember more than just the name of the man who was one of the most remarkable personalities of Edwardian Europe, a great and daring entrepreneur whose largest enterprise, the railway to Constantinople, had kept the chancelleries of Europe busy for decades. This enterprise, in the view of some historians, marked the overture to the drama of the Age of Imperialism. Of his philanthropic enterprises, the greatest was the resettlement of oppressed Russian Jews in Argentina, endowments hitherto unrivaled in scope and scale. 'Turkenhirsch'--the nickname under which Baron de Hirsch was known all over the continent of Europe--is of equal interest to the political and economic historian of the nineteenth century, and to the historian of the Jewish renaissance. 

Herzl met Baron de Hirsch in Paris. Sunday, 2 Jun 1895

Salonique 1917 | Chemins de Fer Orientaux

October 3, 2016, 1:59 pm

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Mavi Boncuk | GB / GRECE . SALONIQUE . GARE DES CHEMINS DE FER ORIENTAUX[1] . Carrioles à cheval + Cachet Censure Miltaire N° 4446 Circulée : 1917 | Editions : M.S.R. / N°28



[1] The Hellenic State Railways took over the standard gauge railway line from Piraeus to Papapouli at the pre-1912 borders, the extension from Papapouli to Platy and most of the former Ottoman railway lines that were within the Greek borders after 1919. These lines were:
Piraeus, Demerli & Frontiers Railway (Greek: Σιδηρόδρομος Πειραιώς-Δεμερλή-Συνόρων), also known as Larisaikos
Part of the former Thessaloniki & Monastir Railway (French: Chemin de fer de Salonique à Monastir or SM)
Part of Chemins de fer Orientaux or CO, between Thessaloniki and Idomeni. The line from Alexandroupolis to Ormenio was transferred to the French-Hellenic Railway Company (Chemin de fer Franco-Hellenique, CFFH) of Evros (Greek: Γαλλοελληνική Εταιρεία Σιδηροδρόμων or ΓΕΣ) which was absorbed by SEK much later, in 1954
The section of Thessaloniki-Constantinople Railway (French: Jonction Salonique-Constantinople or JSC) between Thessaloniki and Alexandroupolis.
The 66 km long Sarakli-Stavros line, a former military line (600 mm (1 ft 11 5⁄8 in) gauge) constructed during World War I.
The 50 km long Skydra local railway, a former military line (600 mm gauge) constructed during World War I and initially operated until 1936 by a company called Local Railways of Macedonia (Greek: Τοπικοί Σιδηρόδρομοι Μακεδονίας).

Chemins de Fer Ottoman d'Anatolie (1888-1927)

October 3, 2016, 2:02 pm

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Mavi Boncuk |

Chemins de Fer Ottoman d'Anatolie (1888-1927)

With the construction of the line to Ankara put on hold, the Ottoman government looked for a new company to build the line. Georg von Siemens, the managing director of the Deutsche Bank was informed on the project, as well as Alfred Von Kaulla, who was in İstanbul to handle the export of the Mauser rifle to the Ottoman Army. After some tension, the Deutsche Bank won the concession to build the line. The original concession was 99 years, but later became 114 years to match the Baghdad Railway.