Tangül Akakıncı: A Life Dedicated to Painting

YEM Yayın has published a new book titled Tangül Akakıncı: Resme Adanmış Bir Ömür / A Life Dedicated to Painting, prepared with the aim of introducing the painter Tangül Akakıncı, her approach to art and painting, and her works to art-loving readers.

 “I always had a concern for form; of course, there was also a concern for color, but I especially wanted to create forms I was not used to seeing...”

 Tangül Akakıncı is a painter who, despite starting her artistic life in the 1960s in Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu's workshop within the State Academy of Fine Arts, continued her art studies for over 50 years with Süleyman Velioğlu. Akakıncı, who was among the founders of the Akatünvel Art Group and passed away in 2021, expressed her understanding of art in depth in an interview with Pelin Özer years ago:

“My father was a saddler, one of the old masters. In my childhood, I often went to his shop in Eminönü, Küçükpazar, and saw various objects related to the horse world: Circassian saddles, Spanish saddles, whips, harnesses, saddlebags, stirrups... A fascinating, intriguing horse world for a child... I would examine the cutting tools my father used. Imagine a half-moon; a handled tool called a chisel, my father would cut leather with it. A very archaic form, unknown to me, never seen before. An interesting iron tool was also used to beat and thin the leather. Interestingly, what was important to me was always the tools themselves, not the process done with them. Until then, I hadn't seen other tools like these around me, nor did I see them later; such things were not part of my education. I had recorded all of them; I realized this later when forms similar to those forms appeared in my paintings... The journey began this way. The unknown always attracted my attention...

... I mostly observed and absorbed monumental rocks. I work in multiple layers to render the stone texture anyway; always by scraping. My father would cut, beat, and fray the leather with his cutting tool. From the beginning, I scraped the paints I worked on layer by layer with a razor blade. Unlike my father, I do the same process with paint. I work in layers, I scrape. After scraping, a new understanding of form emerges, including the composition; the painting changes from its figure to its tone. Then I scrape again, I work again. I never used any tool other than a razor blade. The master used a spatula. We always work on paper. The master would mix white glue with whiting, bring it to a certain consistency, and think about how to place the form he created in his mind on the paper with a spatula, spreading that thick paste. He would start placing colors on it; after placing the colors, if it didn't look right, he would start scraping. I don't use a spatula; I apply the paint with a brush. But when I start scraping, shovelfuls of paint come off; we are perhaps the painters who use the most paint in the world. We work in layers. How many compositions, how many layers can emerge from these, one on top of the other. We start scraping; if it didn't work, if we didn't like it, we would ruin it. Work is done, it finishes or it doesn't. There was never a measure of how long a painting takes. There were paintings we worked on for three years. After the master's death, I tried my best to protect myself. Why did I try to protect myself? From "just good enough," from slacking off, and from being trendy...”

TANGÜL AKAKINCI: A LIFE DEDICATED TO PAINTING

“... There was always a form of sensitivity that I had. Of course, there was also color sensitivity, but I especially wanted to create forms with which I was unfamiliar...”

 Tangül Akakıncı is a painter who began her artistic career in the 1960s at the State Academy of Fine Arts, in the atelier of Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu, but she continued to work with Süleyman Velioğlu for more than 50 years. In an interview with Pelin Özer, carried out years ago, Tangül Akakıncı, one of the founders of Akatünvel Art Group who passed away in 2021, expresses her understanding of art in detail in depth.