EXTRAORDINARY MINAS MASTER’S GENOVEFA STORY

The exhibition titled “Extraordinary Minas, The Story of Inspiration and Innovation in Kutahya Tiles and Ceramics”, which is included in the collection exhibitions of Pera Museum, brings together a valuable selection from the Suna and Inan Kırac Foundation Kutahya Tiles and Ceramics Collection with art lovers.

FATMA BATUKAN BELGE

Pera Museum occasionally presents the works in its collection under different titles. The exhibition dedicated to the Kutahya tile master Minas Avramidis, which is in the Suna and Inan Kırac Foundation Kutahya Tiles and Ceramics Collection, is also shown within this scope.

The Suna and Inan Kırac Foundation has a very rich collection of Kutahya tiles and ceramics. The collection, which began to be established in the 1980s and has expanded and enriched over the years, currently contains around 1000 works. It reveals the development of Kutahya tiles and ceramics art, which has been overshadowed by Iznik tiles, especially between the 18th and 20th centuries. The two catalogue-books related to the collection are among the most important sources in this field.

Before the Ottoman period, Kutahya was a place where ceramics were produced in the Phrygian, Greek, Roman and Byzantine periods with the rich clay beds in its surroundings. Production in Kutahya, which began at the end of the 13th century, continued in parallel with Iznik; while ceramic production in Iznik ended in the 17th century, production in Kutahya managed to survive by resisting. Kutahya ceramicists both met the needs of the people and produced tiles for the covering of some architectural structures. Since there is not enough information about Kutahya ceramics in the 16th and 17th centuries, all of the production during this period has been attributed to Iznik. However, it is mentioned that there were around 300 tile workshops in KUtahya at the end of the 16th century.

Chromolithograph, The Story of Genovefa (Scene 3)  Ceramic plate, 1910-1915 Minas Avramidis

1900-1902 Sotiris Christidis

After the collapse of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia at the end of the 14th century, Armenian families were dispersed to the Mediterranean and Ottoman lands. It is known that there was an Armenian community in Kutahya and that minorities, especially Armenians, worked in tile workshops. Apart from the inscriptions written in Armenian, the patterns have completely Turkish characteristics. Of course, in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, when Armenian masters were dominant, wall tiles and church furniture with Christian themes, far from the Turkish understanding of pattern and color, were also made and used in churches in various cities of the Empire. The decorations of the ceramics produced for the Christian community also included crosses, seraphim/seraphim, cherubim, saint figures, scenes from the Bible and the Torah.

Minas Avramidis, who lived between 1877 and 1954, was also one of the extraordinary tile masters of Kutahya. One of the most striking examples of Minas’s creative world is his series of plates from the 1910s depicting the Genovefa Story. In this series, Minas drew inspiration from the narrative centered on themes such as faith and loyalty. It is thought that he read the story in a late 19th-century Karamanlidika serial publication and saw it in a lithograph produced by Sotiris Christidis, which was widely circulated in Greek Orthodox neighbourhood coffeehouses. Drawing on the colors, motifs, and forms of Kutahya’s rich tile-making tradition, Minas skillfully blended tradition and innovation through his distinctive style, imparting a unique character to Kutahya’s tiles and ceramics. 

Ceramic vase, 1930-1940 Athens Ceramic plate, 1920-1930 The Dome of the Rock Workshop

Kutahia Pottery Company Factory  (Jerusalem)

The Extraordinary Minas exhibition examines the efforts of Kutahya masters to revive the vanished art of tile making in the late 19th and early 20th centuries through works from the Suna and Inan Kırac Foundation Kutahya Tiles and Ceramics Collection, through a master and a group of works. It addresses the concepts of master-apprentice relationships, tradition and innovation, mass production and craft through Minas Avramidis from Kutahya and his series of ceramic plates depicting the Genovefa Story. It also sheds light on the stories of the masters who spread to Kutahya, Athens, Thessaloniki and Jerusalem in the second quarter of the 20th century.