İsmail Acar

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İsmail Acar is a leading Turkish artist in painting. He was born in 1971 and graduated in 1991 from the College of Fine Arts of the Marmara University in Istanbul, Turkey with honors. In 1993, Acar received his Master of Arts degree in "Technology and Art", as well as in "Postmodernism".

He received lessons from and studied wall painting with Prof. M. Plevneli, gravure and printing with Prof. T. Erdogmus, wood press with Prof. Mustafa Aslier, pattern with Prof. B. Cimsir Ali, Turkish Art with Prof. O. Aslan Apa, Sociology of Art with Prof. Nermi Ugur, design with Prof. M. Özer, Byzantine Art with Prof. Semavi Egice, Aesthetics of Art with Prof. Ismail Tunali, calligraphy and decoration illumination with Mr. Sarkis. He performed wall practice projects with Prof. H. Koçan. He studied exhibition preparation with David Salle.

Acar, has also been awarded as "The Most Successful Artist of Turkey" in 2004. His paintings have been exhibited at many galleries within Turkey and abroad, as well as in museums and private collections. The artist had over sixty solo and well over forty joint exhibitions by 2006.

East meets west, and tens of thousands of years' history meets today in a contemporary way by Ismail Acar's paintings. We can also see at the Acar's paintings, all ethnicities, culture and religions meet each others.

Ismail Acar applies contemporary media techniques, including computer technology, to traditional painting techniques. The artist often concentrates on themes such as "Kaftans", "Istanbul" (as the historical Byzantine, Ottoman and the Republic eras), "Three Istanbul: The Capital of Cultures","Hagia Sophia", "Calligraphy", the "Struggle of Women", "Sultans' Portraits", "Harem and Rakkase", "Hagia Sophia and Imaginary Projections", "Pomegranate","Dervish and Rumi", "Tile-Calligraphy", "Roses-Gulname", and "Porcelain Kingdoms", "Gods and Rulers of Anatolia", "Anatolian Kings and Gods" in time, history and geography. Those were some of the titles of his exhibitions.

His 41st individual exhibition titled "Meeting" was in Galata district, with Mevlevi dervishes.

He performed an art exhibition in 1999 in Hagia Sophia Museum in Istanbul for the first time in its 1,600-year-old history that 350,000 people visited.

Ismail Acar and Hagia Sofia was the theme of a documentary film prepared by Serpil Boydak in 1999. Ismail Acar worked on the preparation of the "Hagia Sofia and Imaginary Projections" exhibition with Prof. Semavi Egice.

He painted the world's largest open-air wall-art project in Kaş port, in Antalya in 2000, titled "Clean Nature Clean World". It is 350 m wide and it can be seen from 5 km distance.

The other major exhibitions of Acar held in the Topkapi Palace Museum and the Military Museum in Istanbul, and the Museum of Painting and Sculpture in Ankara, and the Museum of Painting and Sculpture in Izmir. He also held exhibitions in Geneva, Prague and Saint Tropez in 2001, Davos, Switzerland in January 2003, and Tokyo, Japan, and New York in February 2003, Bahrain in May 2004.

In May 2005, he had the "Melange Objects" exhibition at the Camps Elysees in Paris.

His Sultans in Venice exhibition was a major three part art event held during the 51st International Biennale of Venice in June, 2005 organized by the venetian curator Umberto Branchini. The Installations of the Sultans in Venice, curated by Branchini, held in 20 different terraces along the Grand Canal. The second show for Acar in Venice, also curated by Branchini, was The Sultans that held at the Fondaco dei Turchi: Museum of Natural History. The "Red Room" and the "White Room" Exhibitions at The Institute of Science, Literature and Arts, in Grand Canal,Venice was also organized by Branchini and it had a huge success as well as the others.

At the same time, in Venice, the images and the sounds of the video, "Sultan Dream" was realized by Umberto Branchini (art director) Ismail Acar (artist) in collaboration with Bruna Rotunno (video director) and Eraldo Bernocchi (sound designer).

Ismail Acar has been donating one part of the income of all his exhibitions since 2001 to social charity foundations and institutions. Currently, Acar has been continuing his work in Istanbul.