My Magical Month at the Klasik Sanat Art Academy,Istanbul
During the pandemic, I discovered the art of Islamic illuminated paintings- it’s an ancient tradition of decorating sacred documents such as the Koran with golden motifs. After learning as much as I could on youtube and taking some private lessons, I found the Klasik Sanat academy in Istanbul, and began training under my teacher, the great illuminist Nazan Berbercioglu.
Because I began my studies after I left Istanbul, I enrolled in the “distance”program in which I have 6 hours a week of instruction on zoom. Now I’m finishing my third year of illumination and my second year of Ottoman miniature illustration.
I just had a 5 week stay in Istanbul, so I got to attend Nazan’s “In Person” class.
The Klasik Sanat Art Academy is on the Asian side of Istanbul so to get there I take a ferry across the Bosphorus, which in itself is an inspiring experience.
You walk into a normal looking building, take the elevator up and enter a magical, golden, illuminated place full of incredible paintings, books and art supplies. There are two big classrooms, the “online”room for recording the online classes, a kitchen, and a central gallery space where the walls are filled with art.
The class I attended comprises 8 women and takes place Monday’s between 10-2. The first time I hurried to arrive on time, and I was almost the only one there. The women wander in at different times, take out whatever they are working on, and each person works on her own thing. The beauty and intricacy of the other students work was astounding.
The teacher wanders around helping people one at a time. While we are working there is lively discussions, joking, banter and sometimes one of the ladies puts some Turkish music on her phone for all of us to listen to.
Everyone is interested in the other peoples works and sometimes when the teacher is doing something interesting everyone stops what they are doing and gathers round to watch. Also when one lady gets tired of sitting she will walk around the room and check out what everyone else is doing.
There is a woman Selma who is in charge of the kitchen. You can order coffee or chai from her whenever you want and she brings it to you in the class. She also makes delicious homemade food for lunch break, with many vegan options such as lentil soup, borek, green beans and roasted chickpea stew. The menu changes every week.
I’m working on 2 pieces at the same time, both with biblical themes that are meaningful to both Jews and Muslims.
The first is the story of Joseph which is one of my favorite stories. It tells of a man who rose from slavery to become the most powerful man in Egypt through his talents. The painting has many different sections that show various themes from his story - his multi colored coat, the eleven stars, sun and moon from one of his dreams, the eleven sheaves of wheat in a circle bowing to one sheave of wheat in the middle, the well where Joseph’s brothers put him and the silver chalice which Joseph planted in his brothers bags to frame them. It was so cool to see that my classmates were all familiar with the story of “Yusuf” and everyone recognized the symbols.
I decided that I wanted to write the word ‘Yusuf” (Joseph) in Arabic Sufi script which is an amazing form of Arabic calligraphy. I told one of my classmates my plan, and she said “Go to Ahmed Hoca (the head of the school). He specializes in Kufi script.”
I was a bit intimidated but I went to Ahmed Hoca, showed him my sketch and told him that I wanted to write Yusuf in Sufi script. He told me that he would send someone over.
I went back to the classroom to paint and a while later, a woman appeared and said “I’m Funda - I do kufi script. I heard you need something”.
I showed her my work and the space that I wanted the letters and she traced it on some tracing paper and told me she would work on it.
The next week she met me at the school with pages of examples that she had meticulously prepared of the word Yusuf in kufi script and told me to chose the one I preferred. They were all so beautiful - it was so hard to choose!
The second piece I’m working is my interpretation of the genesis story. I paint the Garden of Eden, the moment that Eve is about to pick the forbidden apple in paradise with the snake watching. Eve is completely nude - some of my classmates asked why I didn’t put the leaves to cover her private parts but I explained that she has to be naked since its the moment before her fall into knowledge- only after she bites it does she cover herself. In the last class Nazan told me that instead of staining the page with coffee like I usually do I should do a degrade painting of the page in pastel colors since its paradise. All the students gathered around and watched as she showed us how to do that and now I have a gorgeous background for the painting.
I was sad to leave after the my last class, but i’m grateful that I can continue with the zoom classes until my next trip to Istanbul!
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