OMM PROUDLY RISES IN ESKİŞEHİR
With its young population that contradicts its name that means “Old City” in Turkish, and a contemporary approach to urbanization, Eskişehir, Anatolia’s source of pride, now has something else to be proud of: Odunpazarı Modern Museum.
With its young population that contradicts its name that means “Old City” in Turkish, and a contemporary approach to urbanization, Eskişehir, Anatolia’s source of pride, now has something else to be proud of: Odunpazarı Modern Museum.
Have you noticed a dynamism in Eskişehir recently? The reason behind this is the great interest shown in Eskişehir’s brand-new museum, Odunpazarı Modern MuseumOMM, for short. From its opening on September 8,
2019 to October 7, 2019, the museum has been visited by a total of 22,500 people, while 1,171 students visited the museum on school field trips. I was one of the thousands of visitors and I had the chance to explore the OMM in detail, a museum that can become a contemporary art museum of worldwide fame.
The story of the OMM is actually the story of someone who made a comeback with the arts in his hometown.
Erol Tabanca, one of Turkey’s prominent art collectors, has been collecting artwork by artists from Turkey and abroad for over 15 years. In truth, Tabanca naively embarked on this art collection adventure by being interested in the arts and buying paintings that he liked. When their number exceeded a thousand, this transformed into a willingness to take them out of storage and exhibit them. With the collector’s belief that “venues are more enticing with people in them” and his spirit of sharing, the idea of establishing a modern museum came about. As a result, Erol Tabanca turned something he had been dreaming of for a long time into reality and gave back to Eskişehir, where he was born and bred. Today, many successful businesspeople seek to bestow gratitude on society in various ways for their gains in business life. Erol Tabanca explains why he opted for art among many other projects: “Art is actually a concept that softens all sorts of tough relationships. Art is aesthetics, art is knowledge of history, art is the future. It is also something you can make and remain interested in throughout your life.” It is for certain that art has a unifying
and familiarizing force. With a record number of visitors since the day it opened, the museum brings a dynamism not only to its own building or to Odunpazarı, but also to Eskişehir as a whole, where it also contributes economic advantages.
What can visitors to the OMM expect to see in the museum? The museum’s first exhibition is entitled “Convergence” and is curated by Haldun Dostoğlu. It presents visitors a selection from Erol Tabanca’s collection which brings together figures who have left their mark on modern and contemporary art in Turkey and abroad since the 1950s. The exhibition gets its name from three incidents of “convergence”: Eskişehir getting its first modern art museum, Erol Tabanca’s dream of opening a museum coming true, and the exposure of this art, which to this day had just been seen by a limited number of people, to the public.
The exhibition presents not only the traditional generation of representatives of Turkish modern art such as Burhan Doğançay, Azade Köker,
Nejad Melih Devrim, and
Erol Akyavaş but also the new generation of artists like Taner Ceylan, Sinan Demirtaş, Bora Akıncıtürk,and Ansen. Furthermore, works of many international artists including Peter Zimmerman, Jaume Plensa, Marc Quinn, Robert Longo, Aron Demetz, Sarah Morris, Stephan Kaluza,and Hans Op De Beeck are also on display. As an observer who
lives in Istanbul and closely follows what comes to pass in the art world, the selection I saw in person took me on a pleasant journey of the last 70 years of modern art. For the visitors who reside in Eskişehir and other Anatolian cities, I’m sure this exhibition will broaden their horizons. Besides “Convergence”, the splendid installation specifically designed for the OMM by the world-renowned bamboo art master Tanabe Chikuunsai IV and the VR installation of the digital art collective Marshmallow Laser Feast, which brings science and art together, are among the temporarily exhibited must-see pieces in the museum.
The venue of the OMM also deserves a mention. Built by the Japanese architectural office Kengo Kuma and Associates (KKAA), the museum building was designed by taking the elements of Ottoman civil architecture and traditional Japanese architecture as reference points. The architectural office, which blends nature and architecture by establishing strong ties between the buildings they design and the places where they are built, came up with the perfect project that blends in spectacularly with the historical texture of Odunpazarı. The building is in harmony with the old buildings that surround it and references the wooden framework system of the traditional Odunpazarı houses.
The comprehensive educational program that began at the OMM right after the opening is proof that people will be visiting the OMM more than once. From families with babies to those with children aged 4 and over, youth, adults, and seniors over 65, the museum’s educational program presents a learning experience for all.
Ranging from workshops held with artists to yoga meetups, the OMM aims to be a place of learning, socialization, and sharing for residents of Eskişehir with all sorts of activities. It would be best to take a look at the events calendar on the Internet before planning your trip. Right beside the museum, the OMM INN, designed with inspiration taken from the old Odunpazarı houses as an extension of the museum, presents an enjoyable area of socialization with the food and beverage areas around it and a boutique hotel.
This is not solely an exhibition venue that you must just
“go and see”- it is a part of the lives of those living in Eskişehir, a meeting point that establishes ties with the city’s inhabitants. The dream of the OMM is to promote the museum to the whole world whilst introducing Eskişehir, one of the most modern cities in Anatolia, to modern art. Considering that many people invest in art in Istanbul, the OMM’s efforts to decentralize the art market and spread it to Anatolia are also praiseworthy. In short,these days, the OMM presents more than just an excuse to visit Eskişehir.