Approached through a thematic and chronological narrative that considers the forces shaping the changing visual culture of a given era, the Sakıp Sabancı Museum Painting Collection extends from nineteenth-century Ottoman painting to twentieth-century examples of modern Turkish art. Initiated by Sakıp Sabancı, a prominent businessperson, in the 1970s, and enriched over time through new acquisitions and long-term loans, the collection is presented to visitors in the museum’s modern galleries with the support of Sabancı Holding.

The exhibition draws attention to such phenomena as the legacy of painting instruction initiated in military schools, the Ottoman court’s patronage of the arts, the early years of academic art education, the first nude studies, the earliest exhibition initiatives, the initial experiments with European modernist idioms, and the search for local forms of modernism. At the same time, the diversity of subject matter and formal approaches reflected on canvas is explored through a remarkable array of works that have become part of the history of Turkish painting.

Bringing together a wide range of genres, including landscape, still life, portrait, self-portrait, and nude, within a rich spectrum of stylistic variation, the SSM Painting Collection offers the opportunity to view different generations together. Among the notable early Ottoman painters who left a decisive mark on nineteenth-century Ottoman painting are Osman Hamdi Bey, Şeker Ahmed Paşa, Süleyman Seyyid, Halil Paşa, Hüseyin Zekai Paşa, and Hoca Ali Rıza. The exhibition also features pioneers such as İbrahim Çallı, Hikmet Onat, Avni Lifij, Nazmi Ziya Güran, and Mihri Müşfik, who contributed significantly to the emergence of a new artistic milieu at the turn of the twentieth century, as well as modern painters such as Fikret Mualla, Hale Asaf, Nurullah Berk, Nuri İyem, and Selim Turan, whose singular aesthetic pursuits reveal the experimental and distinctive dimensions of modern Turkish painting. Taken together, these artists illuminate the developmental trajectory of Turkish painting. In its breadth and inclusiveness, the SSM Painting Collection also illuminates the ways in which artistic currents such as Impressionism, Expressionism, and Cubism found resonance in Turkish painting.

In addition to the Sakıp Sabancı Museum’s Emirgan Archive and Avni Lifij Archive, the exhibition incorporates a number of significant collections. Long-term loans from the Seyhun Binzet Postcard Collection, the Istanbul University Feyhaman Duran House of Culture and Arts Collection, the Nedret Kuran Collection, and the Aksoy and Merey family collections lend further breadth to the exhibition.

In this way, many significant works held in different collections are encountered together under one roof.

The exhibition makes visible not only the works of art themselves, but also the museum practices that unfold behind the scenes. A dedicated section focusing on processes such as the research, conservation, and restoration of the works also introduces visitors to the scientific research projects carried out by the Sakıp Sabancı Museum under the title Beyond Vision.

The Sakıp Sabancı Museum Painting Collection can be visited in Gallery -1, from 10.00 to 18.00, except on Mondays.