Home > Culture and Arts News > Final weeks for the Halil Paşa exhibition at Pera Museum: “By the Water’s Edge” ends on August 23

Final weeks for the Halil Paşa exhibition at Pera Museum: “By the Water’s Edge” ends on August 23

The Pera Museum’s exhibition focusing on the life and art of Halil Paşa is entering its final weeks with a selection ranging from portraits to landscapes.

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The countdown has begun for the exhibition “By the Water’s Edge: The Life and Art of Halil Paşa” at the Suna and İnan Kıraç Foundation Pera Museum, which focuses on the life and work of Halil Paşa, one of the leading figures of the Soldier Painters generation. Curated by Dr. Özlem İnay Erten, the exhibition can be visited until Sunday, August 23.

The exhibition examines the portraits, still lifes, and landscapes of Halil Paşa, who holds an important place in the transformation of painting in Turkey from the Ottoman era to the Republic, alongside the geographies, cultural circles, and archival materials that shaped the artist’s life.

A view from the “By the Water’s Edge: The Life and Art of Halil Paşa” exhibition.

FROM THE BOSPHORUS TO THE BANKS OF THE NILE

At the center of the exhibition are the themes of water, shore, and light, which find resonance in Halil Paşa’s paintings across different geographies. Bosphorus landscapes, which bear traces of Beylerbeyi where the artist spent his childhood, make visible the life on the shores of Göksu, Küçüksu, Fenerbahçe, and Bostancı, as well as the reflections on the water’s surface and the changing light.

This pictorial language, shaped on the shores of Istanbul, gains a different atmosphere with the landscapes the artist produced around the Nile during his years in Egypt. The exhibition also reveals to the viewer the visual connection established between Istanbul and Egypt.

The exhibition focuses on Halil Paşa’s pictorial language, which developed around the themes of shore and light.
The artist’s shore-themed works stand out in the exhibition.
The exhibition at the Pera Museum brings together works from different periods of the artist’s career.
Halil Paşa’s Bosphorus-themed works are among the highlights of the exhibition.

Halil Paşa’s years in Paris are also one of the important stops of the exhibition. The artist’s academic training, his relationship with plein air painting, and his competence in portraiture can be followed through works and documents from this period. The award certificate and medal related to the bronze medal he won at the 1889 Exposition Universelle for his “Madam X” portrait are also among the pieces included in the exhibition.

The exhibition also makes visible Halil Paşa’s place within the Soldier Painters generation.
Halil Paşa’s drawings, portraits, and landscapes are presented together in the exhibition.
A view from the section regarding his Paris years and the artist’s close circle.
Portraits and documents from the period are displayed together in the exhibition.

ARCHIVAL DOCUMENTS AND OPEN WORKSHOP

The exhibition addresses not only Halil Paşa’s place in the art of painting but also his relationships with the literary and press circles of the period. The photograph showing the artist working in his studio, which was published on the cover of Servet-i Fünûn in 1898, the circulation of his works in the publications of the time, and the illustrations he prepared for Recâizâde Mahmud Ekrem’s “Araba Sevdası” shed light on this multifaceted production.

Sketchbooks, letters, photographs, and the press archive offer an opportunity to closely examine the working processes behind the works and the cultural environment of the period. The Open Workshop, which accompanies the exhibition and is designed with inspiration from Halil Paşa’s studio, continues to welcome visitors on the 3rd floor of the Pera Museum.

A view from the section of the exhibition themed around his return to Istanbul and landscapes.
The section inspired by Halil Paşa’s studio bears traces of the artist’s working environment.

“By the Water’s Edge: The Life and Art of Halil Paşa” can be visited on the 5th, 4th, and 3rd floors of the Pera Museum until August 23. The museum is open from Tuesday to Saturday between 10:00 and 19:00, and on Sundays between 12:00 and 18:00.

All visitors can visit the museum for free on Fridays between 18:00 and 22:00 as part of “Long Friday,” and all students can visit for free on Wednesdays as part of “Young Wednesday.”