travel albums (1884-1910)

374 Pages·2015·21.76 MB·English

by  Sibel Acar

CAPTURING CONSTANTINOPLE: TRAVEL ALBUMS (1884-1910)

A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO
THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
OF
MIDDLE EAST TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY

BY

SİBEL ACAR

IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR
THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
IN
THE DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE

SEPTEMBER 2015

I hereby declare that all information in this document has been obtained and
presented in accordance with academic rules and ethical conduct. I also
declare that, as required by these rules and conduct, I have fully cited and
referenced all material and results that are not original to this work.

Name, Last name : Sibel Acar

Signature :

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ABSTRACT

CAPTURING CONSTANTINOPLE: TRAVEL ALBUMS
(1884-1910)

Acar, Sibel
Ph.D., Department of Architectural History
Supervisor: Assist. Prof. Dr. Sevil Enginsoy Ekinci

September 2015, 352 pages

This dissertation examines six travel albums of Istanbul produced between 1884 and
1910, held in Pierre de Gigord’s collection of photographs of the Ottoman Empire and
the Republic of Turkey at the Getty Research Institute Library in Los Angeles. It
explores these albums as nineteenth century presentations of Istanbul by considering
the photographers and travelers as the two main actors determining their production as
compilations and by analyzing not only the photographs both individually and as part
of a sequence, but also the titles, page layouts, and captions. The dissertation compares
the contents of albums and observes that tourism worked as a mechanism leading to
common perceptions, common expectations, and common appreciation, which in turn
created a gaze that influenced the view of the city. It draws on the travelogues,
memoirs and guidebooks of the time to grasp the mindsets in which these images and
albums were first made, used and understood. While looking at the relationship
between the representations of certain architectural subjects in the albums through
photographs and in travel writing through verbal accounts, it also investigates the
parallel approaches in the engravings of these subjects as the previous form and the
technique of visual representation.

Keywords: Nineteenth century, travel albums, Istanbul, architectural and urban history
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ÖZ

CONSTANTINOPLE’U KAYDETMEK: SEYAHAT ALBÜMLERİ
(1884-1910)

Acar, Sibel
Doktora, Mimarlık Tarihi Doktora Programı
Tez Yöneticisi: Yard. Doç. Dr. Sevil Enginsoy Ekinci

Eylül 2015, 352 sayfa

Bu tez, Los Angeles Getty Araştırma Enstitüsü Kütüphanesi Pierre de Gigord, Osmanlı
İmparatorluğu ve Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Fotoğrafları Koleksiyonu’nda bulunan, 1884 ve
1910 yılları arasında üretilmiş altı seyahat albümünü inceler. Her bir albümü
İstanbul’un bir ondokuzuncu yüzyıl sunumu olarak ele alır. Fotoğrafçı ve gezgini bu
albümleri üreten aktörler olarak kabul eder. Albümlerin incelenmesinde fotoğrafların
görsel içeriklerinin yanısıra malzeme özellikleri, sayfa düzenleri, başlıklar,
fotoğrafların sıralamaları gibi unsurları da gözönünde bulundurur. Bu çalışma,
albümlerin içeriklerini karşılaştırırken turizmin ortak algılar, ortak beklentiler, ortak
beğeniler oluşmasına neden olduğunu gözlemler. Albümlerin oluşturuldukları dönemi
anlayabilmek için seyahatname ve rehber kitaplara bakar. Bu kitaplardaki konu
seçimleri ve konuların betimlenme biçimleriyle albümlerdeki fotoğrafları karşılaştırır.
Ayrıca gravürler ve fotoğraflar arasındaki paralel yaklaşımları araştırır.

Anahtar Kelimeler: Ondokuzuncu yüzyıl, seyahat albümleri, İstanbul, fotoğraf, kent
ve mimarlık tarihi.

v
To Bülent, Erk, and Öge

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor Asst. Prof. Dr. Sevil Enginsoy
Ekinci for her valuable guidance, support, advice, criticism, and insight throughout this
study.
Thanks also to my dissertation monitoring committee members Prof. Dr. Cânâ Bilsel
and Prof. Dr. Belgin Turan Özkaya for their comments, encouragements and
constructive criticism.
As well, I am obliged to express my kindest appreciation to Prof. Dr. Edhem Eldem, who
so generously took the time to give me suggestions on how I should read the material I
had gathered at the early stages of this dissertation when I had not yet formed a clear
framework, as well as helping me at its final stage with his constructive feedback and
recommendations.
Thanks also go to Assoc. Prof. Neşe Gurallar for her insightful comments.
I deeply appreciate Bahattin Öztuncay’s patience with my long questions about the
albums I studied and his invaluable contribution to this work with his insight into the
albums and photographs I consulted him on for his immense experience with Ottoman
era photography research.
I would like to extend my gratitude to the staff of the Getty Research Library, and in
particular, Isotta Poggi, Assistant Curator of Photographs Collection Development, who
responded to my questions about the Pierre de Gigord Collection.

Mr. Aydın Bağardı must also be mentioned here for kindly providing me with the
documentary, İstanbul Toplayan Adam: Pierre de Gigord to watch and for sharing his
knowledge with me about the collection.
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I would be remiss not to thank the helpful staff at the Salt Galata Research Library and
Atatürk Library for assisting me in accessing the resources I needed and for acquiring
digital copies of them.

Finally, I extend my heartfelt thanks to all of the wonderful people around me who
supported me throughout this challenging process, and in particular, my family.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

PLAGIARISM…………………………………………………………………………iii
ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………...…….iv
ÖZ……………………………………………………………………………………….v
DEDICATION…………………………………………………………………...…….vi
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………..…………………….vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………………...…….…ix
LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………..xi
LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………………………xii
CHAPTER
1.INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................1
1.1 On Pierre de Gigord Collection .............................................................................5
1.2 On the Materiality of Photographs……………………………................………7
1.3 On the Travel Albums Examined in the Thesis……………………………..….11
1.4 On Literature……………………………………………...................................16
1.5 On the Method of the Examination………………………………………….....24
2. “HOW TO SEE CONSTANTINOPLE”………………. ………………………......29
2.1 Tourism………………………………………………………………………….29
2.2 Travelogues and guidebooks…………………………………………………....47
2.2.1 On the beaten track………………………………………………………....54
2.2.2 Pressed for time…………………………………………………………….63
2.2.3 Picturesque Confusion……………………………………………………...68
2.2.4 “What have they not seen?”………………………………………………..70
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2.2.5 Judging Ottoman modernity………………………………………………..75
2.2.6 Collecting sights……………………………………………………………82
2.3 Photography……………………………………………………………………..89
3. TRAVEL ALBUMS……………………………………………………………….114
3.1 Constantinople 1885…………………………………………………………..120
3.2 Souvenir de Constantinople par Sébah and Joaillier…………...…………….143
3.3 Album Vues de Constantinople 1884……………………………………….…161
3.4 Turquei Album………………………………………………………………..181
3.5 Constantinople. Musée, Types, Sctari, Brousse………………………………196
3.6 Untitled Album………………………………………………………………..217
4. CAPTURING CONSTANTINOPLE……………………………………………...239
4.1 The city as an object of pleasure……………………………………………..241
4.1.1 General views of the city………………………………………………...247
4.1.2 Urban centers…………………………………………………………….260
4.1.3 The built environment as a part of landscape…………………………....270
4.2 The city as an object of knowledge…………………………………………...274
4.2.1 Bird’s-eye views and panoramas……………………………………….274
4.2.2 Architectural representations in photographs…...……………………...278
5. CONCLUSON……………………………………………………………………..288
REFERENCES……………………………………………………………………….299
APPENDICES
A: Travel albums in Pierre de Gigord Collection of photographs
of the Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Turkey in Getty
Research Institute Library in Los Angeles…………………………………..323
B: Curriculum Vitae………………………………………………………...…..331
C: Turkish Summary……………………………………………………………334
D: Tez Fotokopisi Onay Formu…………………………………………………352

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