Karl Talip Kara
Galata
2024
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 100 × 100 cm
- Viewing
- At the showroom — by appointment
At the centre of the composition rises the Galata Tower, its shaft worked like a panel of İznik tiles adorned with tulip and carnation motifs, its conical roof woven from many-coloured squares. Around it, houses with brightly painted façades, boats with flower-patterned sails gliding on the Golden Horn, minarets and domes along the horizon and pale blue rays of light spreading from the sky compose a vivid, densely packed scene in which the classical Turkish decorative arts are carried into a contemporary panorama of Istanbul. The artist's signature appears at the lower right.
About the Artist
Karl Talip Kara (b. 1978, Brussels) studied fine arts at the Institut Saint-Luc in Brussels and continued his training in Paris and, between 2010 and 2012, at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) in Beijing. Having travelled through thirty-eight countries, he first encountered calligraphy in China and settled in Turkey around 2012. He carries the motifs of the classical Turkish-Islamic arts — calligraphy, İznik tilework and illumination — into contemporary oil painting, blending them with Far Eastern influences; he has exhibited in Brussels, Baku, Astana, Beijing and Istanbul and is among the artists of the Eclectic Gallery in London. The Galata Tower and the Istanbul skyline are recurring subjects of his vividly coloured, densely layered compositions.
All Artists →