SUMMARY OF THE BOOK

8 x 9.25 inches
272 pages
in English with a Turkish translation
hardbound
includes a 16 page insert Taxi Rides, a photo novella

This is a visual book about the social themes that define contemporary Turkey and that specifically examines the imagery of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, its revolutionary leader after World War 1. The State of Ata is an artists’ book in its conception and design that weaves together photographs, interviews, artists’ interventions and archival imagery. This is a critical visual exploration on the meaning of Atatürk’s imagery and how it is used in Turkish society today. He is seen as the link to Western culture. His image is being used as a symbol in opposition to the rise of the Islamist political movement. During an eleven year period between 1997 and 2008, we, as artists, one Turkish, one American, have become engaged in this project to better understand this conflict.

Since we began this project, there has been an emergence of political Islam everywhere in the world, including Turkey. Our book seeks to recognize the complex dynamics of a culture that is 99% Muslim, but is committed to secularism.The State of Ata is a portrait of both sides of the body politic: that of the secular revolutionary hero as well as the Islamic scarf. As the country is physically divided, part in Europe, part in Asia, the unfolding story of Turkey is a powerful metaphor for the conflicts we face not only West and East, also here within the United States between secularism, democracy and religion.

In the tradition of Robert Frank’s exposition of The Americans,The State of Ata chronicles our experiences photographing the people in Turkey as we found them: students, families, couples, friends, on the street, in the office, or in the countryside. We photographed people, secular and Western, or religious and conservative in appearance. We made thousands of photographs, conducted interviews and collected found material from archives, gathering popular historical illustrations and other artifacts. Many graphic representations of Atatürk that were originally based on photographs, were later interpreted by many different artists along the way, each one more removed from the original. This has created a body of public imagery that is often far removed from the likeness of Atatürk, but has become an image shorthand, an iconography similar to the imagery of other cult figures.

The book is conceived as a collection of books within books; a photo book, comic book, school book, album of military portraits, a diary... Like other artists’ books made by Bill Burke, I Want to Take Picture, Clifton Meador, The Long Slow March, Jim Goldberg, Raised by Wolves, Susan Meiselas' books, The State of Ata is an art object informed by the design, the layout, sequence of images, and the relationship between image and text.

Book description in detail

The State of Ata addresses the social themes that define contemporary Turkey. Specifically examining the imagery of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the country’s revolutionary leader after World War I, the volume interweaves photographs, interviews, artists’ interventions and archival imagery. The result is a complex visual exploration of the uses of Atatürk’s imagery and the way in which it functions in contemporary Turkish society as a perceived link to Western culture, and as a symbol in opposition to the rise of the Islamist political movement . During a twelve year period between 1997 and 2009, we, as artists, one Turkish, one American, have become engaged in this project to better understand this conflict. We conceived The State of Ata as a collection of books within a book—a photograph album, a volume of military portraits, a diary, a photo novella—and the result is a unique project that will appeal not only to those fascinated by Turkish culture, but also to anyone interested in the popular representations of cult historical figures.

Our assumption is that our audience is unaware of the significance of Atatürk’s symbolism in Turkish culture. Therefore we begin our book with a series of photographs establishing his presence, to engage the curiosity of our audience in an image that is unfamiliar. On public streets imposing Atatürk monuments loom over pedestrians walking and waiting. An anonymous voice is imprinted over the photographs: “He is a person I want to be with... a person I want to die for.” As a counterpoint, he is dwarfed in the final picture of this first series by a huge mosque, utility poles and wires. His sculptural presence is diminished, or at the very least now seems to be at risk.

We follow this with a diarist narrative of our journey traveling on the Anatolian plateau from one small town to another looking for the many Atatürk sculptures that are everywhere. Sharia law prohibited figurative imagery as idolatrous. But after Turkish independence, the symbolic image of Atatürk became the icon that connected the citizen to the image of a new Turkey. After his death a great many sculptures of Atatürk were constructed across the countryside. Today, when a Turkish town commissions an Atatürk sculpture it is considered a patriotic accomplishment. Atatürk busts announce the entrance of every school. His image pervades Turkish life in the form of billboards, posters, banners, post cards, and logos for political parties and media. A variety of Atatürk iconic images communicate the military hero, father of the country, visionary thinker, planner, teacher, religious leader, even fashion model, as he moved to reinvent every facet of Turkish life including mode of dress. His framed picture is hung in thousands of offices, shops and homes throughout the country. With the present-day struggle between secularists, fascists, nationalists, Islamists, and the military, there is an increasing interest in using the image of Atatürk as an emblem for every political position. Atatürk may have saved the country in 1923; today his imagery is a symbol that's caught between the disparate factions of Turkish society.

In the tradition of Robert Frank’s exposition of The Americans, The State of Ata chronicles our experiences photographing the people in Turkey as we found them: students, families, couples, friends, on the street, in the office, or in the countryside. We photographed people, secular and Western, or religious and conservative in appearance. We made thousands of photographs, conducted interviews and collected found material from archives, gathering popular historical illustrations and other artifacts. Many graphic representations of Atatürk that were originally based on photographs were later interpreted by many different artists along the way, each one more removed from the original. This has created a body of public imagery that is often far removed from the likeness of Atatürk, but has become an image shorthand, an iconography similar to the imagery of other cult figures.

In one chapter Chantal recreates the design of a primary textbook from her childhood. Here she speaks to her indoctrination into Kemalist ideology. The book tells the story of the revolutionary hero. Here is a photo of his place of birth. In another, he is sailing to central Anatolia to plan the revolution. Atatürk sleeps in the snow between battles. He leads a parliamentary convention, and upon victory there are pictures that illustrate his reforms: dissolving religious rule, and forbidding the wearing of religious clothing in public, pointing to the new alphabet, and speaking to the nation on radio. The textbook pictures show him working tirelessly until his death in 1938, forging a mythic ideology that continues to this day.

Our project includes a number of artists’ interventions where we set up a situation where one might interact with Atatürk’s image. In one intervention we unwittingly became spectacularly enmeshed in the story we came to witness: On a summer morning in Ankara we hear the sounds of a political rally. Around the corner, hundreds of Islamists were marching, chanting protests. Chantal retrieves a small framed postcard of Atatürk and we run to get ahead of the crowd so that Mike can make a picture. As the black-robed women and bearded men parade by, Chantal holds up high the portrait of Atatürk. In a few moments, the crowd passes us by. We did not realize until much later that the image we created was captured on video by a Reuters videographer, and that night on the news Chantal becomes a TV sensation.

The power of the image of Atatürk is incisively understood in the following days: All of the national newspapers display her image on the front page, and in banner headlines she is called “The Girl of the Republic,” “Courageous Girl,” and “Brave Heart.” The video is played repeatedly on the national news for the next week. In response, the religious media variously portray Chantal as a provocateur, a Jew, or as an agent of the CIA, with a “plan to divide the Turkish nation.” The headlines for each day’s paper develop the story with details. For ten days the issue of Chantal’s image captivates the country, and ironically, Chantal is transformed by the media into another political symbol allied with Atatürk. We come to realize that the imagery of Atatürk serves as a strong, personal weapon in the battle for Turkey’s future.

The next photographic sequence recognizes the new battle within Turkish culture that revolves around feminine political fashion, the wearing of the scarf and even more extremely, the wearing of the çarsaf, (the Turkish chador) the black body cover that leaves only a small opening for the eyes. Religious dress has become a political statement that counterpoints the sexually evocative styles from Europe and the West. Ironically, the most recent Islamist fashion is a new hybrid that puts sex back into religion. Dark mascara outlines the eyes and the scarves are designed in bright patterns of silk. Underneath, the hair is shaped into a bun to enlarge the size of the head and make the scarf even more prominent and bold. What was originally meant as a cover up has now been reinvented as sexual allure.

The book also features interviews by Turkish writers, Murat Belge, Cengiz Çekil, Sibel Eraslan and Sevan Nisanyan, academics, columnists as well as people that we met casually in the street. One person who requested to be quoted anonymously states, "We don't need to wear Atatürk pins on our chests, but if my wife and I don't fight today, what kind of Turkey are we leaving to our children? It's not Atatürk we are fighting for. He was a man, with all the failing that any man may have. But secularist ideas must remain the foundation of our future. And his image is the symbol of our fight."

The final chapter of the book is a series of photographs that portray the countervailing force to Islamist politics: the military. In one sequence, young men newly drafted, come to a local photographer to have their picture made. These photoshop extravaganzas collage parents, lovers, brothers and sisters, with the newly minted soldier, and include fighter planes screaming through exotic backgrounds. In another sequence, crowds jam Atatürk Stadium to commemorate the beginning of the Independence War. Thousands of school children are trained to hold placards of different colors, becoming human pixels illustrating mythic stories of battle and victory. Soldiers march in parade formation while officers stare at attention. But the placards are not perfectly positioned. The event is not without its moments of boredom and pretension.

Since we began this project in 1997, there has been an emergence of political Islam everywhere in the world, including Turkey. Our book seeks to recognize the complex dynamics of a culture that is 99% Muslim, but is committed to secularism. The State of Ata is a portrait of both sides of the body politic: that of the secular revolutionary hero as well as the Islamist scarf. As the country is physically divided, part in Europe, part in Asia, the unfolding story of Turkey is a powerful metaphor for the conflicts we face not only West and East, also here within the United States between secularism, democracy and religion. But, finally, this is an artists’ book. The story of politics and culture is embedded in an artist’s vision that weaves imagery, found artifacts, the diarist narrative of our journey, interviews and interventions. This book, like other artists’ books made by Bill Burke, I Want to Take Picture, Clifton Meador, The Long Slow March, Jim Goldberg, Raised by Wolves, and Susan Meiselas' books, is an art object in which the design, the layout, sequence of images, the relationship between image and text becomes a powerful aesthetic that embodies ideas, social and political.