Tiraje Dikmen

Who was Tiraje Dikmen? (1925 Istanbul – September 1, 2014 Istanbul)

Fatma Tiraje Dikmen is one of the most important representatives of Turkish modern painting who gained fame beyond the country’s borders. With her original approach to color, figure, and abstraction, she earned a respected place in both Turkish and Parisian art circles. Her works, associated with surrealism in the international art world, are among the strong examples of the intellectual connection that modern Turkish painting established with Europe.

Life;
Tiraje Dikmen was born in 1925 in Büyükada, Istanbul. Her father was Cafer Fahri Bey, a Georgian immigrant from Batumi and one of Turkey’s first microbiologists. She was the second child in a family of two; her older sister was the painter Şükriye Dikmen. Her family environment was highly qualified both scientifically and artistically. The fact that painters such as Namık İsmail and Feyhaman Duran were close to the family enabled Dikmen to come into contact with art at an early age. At her father’s insistence, she learned French at a young age along with her older sister. She graduated from Işık High School in 1940. She then graduated from Istanbul University Faculty of Economics in 1946 and completed her doctorate at the same faculty. As part of her doctoral thesis entitled “Working Conditions of Female Workers in Istanbul,” she conducted extensive field research in the Cibali, Eyüpsultan, Tophane, and Üsküdar districts between 1946 and 1949. This sociological and economic background laid the groundwork for her later in-depth exploration of the relationship between humanity and society in her art. Between 1943 and 1948, she also attended Léopold Lévy’s studio as a private student at the Istanbul State Academy of Fine Arts. In 1949, she went to Paris on a French government scholarship. While attending the Faculties of Law and Economics in Paris, she continued her work in Lévy’s studio. During his first five years in Paris, he completed internships in art history and museology at the Louvre Museum and the Museum of Folk Art and Traditions. During this period, he established relationships with a circle that included figures such as Max Ernst, Yves Bonnefoy, Man Ray, and Jacques Herold. He produced drawings that explored the concept of the figure.

In 1956, he held his first solo exhibition at Galerie Edouard Loeb in Paris, exhibiting only his drawings. The support of Max Ernst, who purchased one of his drawings and wrote positive reviews, increased his visibility in the Paris art scene. During his second five years in Paris, he focused on the “phenomenon of color” and presented his oil paintings in an exhibition, again at Galerie Edouard Loeb.

In 1961, he participated in the “Turkish Artists in Paris” exhibition held at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Istanbul. In 1963, he was featured in the “Contemporary Turkish Art” exhibition at the Musée d’Art Moderne in Paris. In 1964, she was invited to the exhibition “Le Surréalisme: Source – Histoire – Affinités,” held at Galerie Charpentier in Paris, one of the most important galleries of the time, and considered one of the most significant exhibitions in the history of Surrealism. That same year, she held a solo exhibition at Galerie Birtschansky. Léopold Lévy, who passed away in 1966, appointed Tiraje Dikmen as his official heir, leaving his studio and works to her. With a sense of responsibility towards her teacher, Dikmen prepared a detailed archive of all of Lévy’s works and continued her work in this studio from 1967 onwards. The May 1968 events in France deeply affected the artist; she interpreted this period in her series titled “Mai 1968.” With these works, which she brought from Paris, she held her first solo exhibition in Istanbul in 1970. From the 1980s onwards, she lived primarily in Istanbul, in the mansion where she was born on Büyükada Island. However, she never closed her studio in Paris and noted in her biography, “She never left Paris.”
In 1985, she opened her fourth solo exhibition, “Memory of Times,” at Galeri Nev in Ankara. In the 1990s, she primarily produced works focusing on the theme of migration. She particularly avoided exhibitions, preferring experimental works.