ANKARA POSTER COMPETITION TO PORTRAY ARMENIANS AS GENOCIDAL, TRAITORS
By Weekly Staff on September 29, 2014
Winner to Be Announced on Dink Assassination Anniversary
ANKARA, Turkey (A.W.)–Ankara’s public Gazi University, in
collaboration with the Embassy of Azerbaijan, has announced the launch
of a poster competition that encourages participants to design artworks
on the theme, “Everyone Sleeping: Armenian Persecutions from Anatolia
to the Caucasus, International Poster Competition.” The winner(s)
will be announced on January 19, the anniversary of the assassination
of Hrant Dink, the Turkish-Armenian journalist and editor of Agos who
was murdered by an ultra-nationalist Turkish youth in Istanbul in 2007.
Ankara poster competition to portray Armenians as genocidal, traitors
In introducing the competition, a lengthy, fictionalized account of
Turkish history is provided–an account in which Armenians committed
genocide against Turks and Azerbaijanis. Under the rule of Seljuk
Turks, and later the Ottoman Empire, Armenians lived in peace, which
brought about the “Golden Age” of the Armenians. Armenians were offered
religious and other freedoms, human rights, and a general attitude of
benevolence. This all changed when Armenians, instigated by Western
powers, began to rebel and ceased to be the once “loyal nation.”
Painting a treacherous portrayal of Armenians, the organizers go on
to describe how Armenians tried to “dismantle” the country, supported
by Russian, British, and French forces. In order to “prevent damage,”
an effort to relocate them came about. “The aim was not to destroy the
Armenians; the purpose was to protect them and to ensure the security
of the state,” the competition organizers claim, though conceding that
some deaths did occur–around 50,000 (the 1.5 million number is a gross
exaggeration they claim). Muslims, on the other hand, were killed in
greater numbers–around two million. As to the matter of genocide,
the true victims of WWI were the Turks, they say. It was the Turks
who suffered genocide–around one million Turks were killed at the
hands of Armenian gangs–in Van, Mush, Bitlis and elsewhere.
The organizers “remind” potential participants of the “Unimaginable
tortures and rapes,” the suicides of women hoping to preserve their
chastity, the slaughters of young and old alike at the hands of the
Armenians, as well as the mass graves, and the massacres at the hands
of “Dashnag gangs.” Armenians are portrayed as conduits of “savagery,
cruelty, torture, rape…”
Despite “these painful events of the Turkish nation,” Mustafa Kemal
Ataturk (who also happened to establish Gazi University) founded
modern Turkey, which managed to survive despite “Armenian terrorism.”
But apparently Armenian crimes do not end here. The organizers evoke
the Karabagh war, where they claim yet another genocide took place
in 1992, that of Azerbaijanis in Khojaly.
“The Turkish world suffered genocide… silence continues… Everyone
is asleep… and while everyone was asleep, the Turks were massacred
again.
Everyone is asleep despite the historical facts that are attacked
by the narrative of Armenians and their supporters and the so-called
genocide allegations,” write the organizers. Furthermore, the Armenian
allegations amount to “slander,” “injustice,” and “defamation.”
The organizers invite international artists and designers who care
for human rights and want the world to wake up to the genocide and
massacres committed by Armenians, to participate in this poster
competition.
The winner(s) will be announced on Jan. 19, 2015.
Exhibition of submitted works will take place at the Gazi University
Museum of Painting and Sculpture beginning on Feb. 26, 2015. The
grand prize is an exhibition of the winning work in Baku.
Organizers include: Ambassador of Azerbaijan to Ankara Faig Bagirov;
Flame Cakmakoglu (Gazi University); Fulya Bayraktar (Gazi University);
Ã…~^ansal Evans (Gazi University); Bulent Salderay (Gazi University);
and Ali Herisc (Gazi University).
Jury members include: Arif Aziz, dean of the State University of
Fine Arts and Civilization (Azerbaijan); Ugurcan Akyuz, Near East
University, dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts and Design (Northern
Cyprus); Mehmet Basbug, the Kyrgyzstan-Turkey Manas University, dean
of the Faculty of Fine Arts (Kyrgyzstan); Seifolla Bodikov, Buketov
Karaganda State University dean (Kazakhstan); Rustam Khudayberganov,
Behzo Drafting and Design University (Uzbekistan); Sabit Magavin,
Buketov Karaganda State University (Kazakhstan); Sevil Suleymanova,
State Art Academy dean (Azerbaijan); Adnan Tepecik, dean of Faculty of
Fine Arts, Design and Architecture (Turkey); Yeralin Kuandyk, Ahmet
Yesevi University (Kazakhstan); Alisher Alikulov, Kamolitdin Behzoda
Ressamlik ve Tasarim University dean (Uzbekistan); Cigdem Demir,
Gazi University, Faculty of Fine Arts in Visual Communication Design
Department (Turkey); and Suiutbek Torobekov, dean of the National
Art Academy (Kyrgyzstan).
The Exhibition organizing committee includes: Naile Cevik, Umut
Demirel, Ramazan Can, and Giray Selcuk.
The graphic design board includes: Dilek Oguzoglu, Yilmaz Ciracioglu,
and Zeynep Pehlivan.