Anatolian Travels at Arkas casts realistic eye on 19th century

Travelers from French scientific missions to Anatolia brought back a sober and non-exoticized vision of the Orient during the 19th century. Now, the Arkas Art Center in İzmir is providing a glimpse at how sojourners saw the later Ottoman Empire.

At the heart of the exposition called "Anatolian Travels" at the Arkas Art Center in İzmir, a surprisingly modern drawing shows Ottoman figures in gouache among the pencil sketches of archaeological details of the "Gate of Persecution" in Ephesus, just a two hours' drive from the city.

The sketch, daring in its mixed use of pencil, ink, watercolor and gouache on paper, is the work of Louis François Cassas, a French landscape painter and archaeologist. Cassas arrived in Turkey in 1784, first to Istanbul and then to the southern provinces of the Ottoman Empire. This was no easy task: La Poulette, the royal corvette that carried the team, was forced to stop at İzmir, the ancient Smyrna, where Cassas toured the city and its environs, including Ephesus. The result was an extensive portfolio of drawings that enabled the artist to publish a new edition of "Picturesque Journeys" dedicated to Smyrna, some of which are now part of the new exhibition in İzmir's Arkas Art Center.

Cassas' drawings were part of the many works that came out of the French "scientific missions" of the 19th century, subsidized by the French state or by the travelers themselves.   They were carried out by archaeologists, sociologists, historians, painters and scientists.

"Anatolian Travels were executed for a better understanding of the East, as well as drawing a complete portrait of the Orient," said Lucien Arkas, the chairman of Arkas Holding, at the opening of the exhibition. "These travels have left behind many...