FİKRET OTYAM

ANATOLIA IS SHEDDING TEARS OUR WORLD HAS LOST FİKRET OTYAM

Painter, photographer, journalist, writer, poet, intellectual Fikret Otyam was born in Aksaray on December 19, 1926.

His photography passion started at the secondary school when his French teacher retired colonel Mr. Haşim gave a photograph machine; and he started painting with tins of paint on plywood.

Following the first exhibition at Community Centre, he stepped to the workshop of the great painter İbrahim Çallı and then studied at the State Academy of Fine Arts in İstanbul. He finished his education at famous painter Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu’s workshop. Photography and painting were not enough to express his pure soul and artistry so that he started writing at “Son Saat” newspaper in 1950 and worked as a journalist for years.

By touring South-eastern and Eastern Anatolia making interviews with Yaşar Kemal from Cumhuriyet Newspaper, Fikret Otyam learned more about Anatolian people; the soul of Anatolia and philosophical savings influenced him a lot. This journey led him give Anatolian lover works during his artistry life. Focusing on the Eastern Anatolia, it is known that there are plenty of Turkish folk songs, which have not come to light yet, in his archive.

He especially focused on eye figures on his paintings and depicted the eyes bigger and attracting, the nose and mouth smaller. According to him, there are three beautiful eyes: the first is the eyes of an Eastern Anatolian woman; the second is the eyes of a donkey-foal and the last is the eyes of an antelope.

Fikret Otyam, who subjected the light of his heart to the toiles, photographs, and plenty of poems and books, was awarded many times including UNESCO AIAP (Association Internationale des Arts Plastiques) Turkish Committee.

We will always remember Fikret Otyam, who died on August 9, 2015, in Antalya… May god rest his soul…

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