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October 2017

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Exhibition of Gökmen Önay’s photographs

Date: 05.10.2017 - 13.11.2017
Place: Kraków Public Library, ul. Rajska 1,
Organiser: Kraków Public Library, Section of Kurdish Studies of the Jagiellonian University
Exhibition of Gökmen Önay’s photographs

Kraków Public Library and The Section of Kurdish Studies of the Jagiellonian University are hosting the photo exhibition by Gökmen Önay entitled Allah created the Kurds so that the mountains won’t be desolate,

The title of the exhibition by Gökmen Önay refers to the old Turkish proverb Allah Kürtleri yarattı dağlar hali kalmasın diye, describing the Kurds and indicating their primitive and unsophisticated nature. For many decades the Kurds in Turkey were called “mountain Turks”, associated with unrefined tribal culture, and rejected any recognition or political status. The 20th century witnessed the multiple Kurdish uprisings of 1925, 1927 or 1937, and finally the guerilla war that erupted in 1984. Although this reality started to change in the new millennium, giving hope for some peaceful resolution of the Kurdish issue, the situation has worsened since 2015.

On the other hand, the information and knowledge regarding the Kurds, although considerably developed in recent years, still focuses on conflict, war, resistance and political issues leaving very little space for any other topics and discourses. We can hardly learn anything about any thoughts and feelings expressed in Kurdish language or through the artistic activity, and these are the very important elements constituting our grasp of humanness. It results in a very distorted image of the Kurds and their dehumanisation. Due to the fact that our modern sense of dignity animating the concept of human rights is often based on notions such as humanity or humanness, the Kurds are easily and sometimes even unconsciously denied dignity too. In other words, in our modern world, they are not treated as equal opponents or partners with whom one may want to reconcile and cooperate. This exhibition draws from an abusive Turkish saying in order to show that even such words may contain some positive sense and beauty providing that someone is open to see and hear them.

The 52 pictures by Gökmen Önay present the life of a small town called Bazit (Doğubayazıt in Turkish), located in Kurdistan, near the Turkish-Iranian border, under the slopes of the Ararat mountain. Were the mountains so lonely and desolate that Allah decided to send the Kurds to them? In such a case, the Kurds must possess some unique capacities that are needed in our more and more desolate and devastated modern world. Treating the Turkish proverb as a source of beauty instead of abuse we shed some light on the very different moments of Bazit’s life filled with happiness and sorrow, tranquility and unrest. The organisers of the exhibition believe that it is not necessarily the military resistance and war, but rather the beauty of people and their culture that can make their neighbours more willing to see them as dignified human beings and to coexist and cooperate with them on an equal basis.

Adopted from a text by Gökmen Önay and Joanna Bocheńska