Atlı Köşk (The Mansion with the Horse)

Poised on one of the Bosphorus’s finest slopes in Emirgan, Atlı Köşk takes its name from the bronze horse sculpture in its garden. Commissioned in 1925 by Prince Mehmed Ali Hasan and designed by the Italian architect Edoardo De Nari, the mansion remained unoccupied when its owner returned to Egypt. In 1951, it was acquired by the businessman Hacı Ömer Sabancı, marking a new phase both as a residence and as a locus of collecting. The bronze horse, signed by the 19th-century French sculptor Louis-Joseph Daumas and purchased at an auction in Kadıköy in 1952, was placed in the garden and, over time, became the mansion’s defining emblem.

Inside, traces of domestic life are presented together with an art collection shaped with care over many years. The ground-floor Family Rooms, which retain their original character, reflect the Ottoman elite’s 19th-century orientation toward Western aesthetics. Gilt mirrors, silk-upholstered seating, vases with Napoleonic emblems, French tapestry suites, Venetian crystal, Persian carpets, and refined paintings illuminate how interior decoration evolved during Istanbul’s cultural modernisation. The reception salons known as the Pink Room and the Blue Room, together with the formal Dining Room, hosted the Sabancı family as well as visiting diplomats and cultural figures.

Among the notable contemporary works on this floor is Ai Weiwei’s porcelain installation Pillar (2006–2007), produced in Jingdezhen, China’s historic porcelain centre. This two-part monumental work brings traditional craftsmanship into dialogue with a contemporary approach, engaging questions of scale, serial production, and formal complexity. Acquired following the exhibition Ai Weiwei on Porcelain (2017–2018), Pillar invites visitors to revisit porcelain’s historical significance and symbolic dimensions in contemporary terms.

The upper floor houses the Arts of the Book and Calligraphy Collection, comprising rare examples of Turkish and Islamic art from the late 14th to the 20th century: manuscript Qur’ans, prayer books, single leaves by illuminators and calligraphers, diplomatic documents bearing imperial tuğras, and elegant writing implements fashioned from silver, coral, and ivory. The collection traces the development of Ottoman calligraphy through leading figures including Şeyh Hamdullah (d. 1520), Derviş Ali (d. 1673), Hâfız Osman (d. 1698), Şekerzade Mehmed (d. 1753), Mahmud Celaleddin (d. 1829), Sâmi Efendi (d. 1912), and Necmeddin Okyay (d. 1976).

Bridging this heritage with contemporary practice, Kutluğ Ataman’s video installation Mesopotamian Dramaturgies: Water, no. 5 reconstructs the symmetry and cadence of calligraphic compositions through a digital idiom, proposing a new visual language between tradition and the contemporary. QR codes on the labels enable visitors to access complete manuscripts in digital form for close study.

In the garden, Anish Kapoor’s granite sculpture Double probes spatial perception through the interplay of light and void. Acquired after the solo exhibition Anish Kapoor in İstanbul (2013–2014), this reflective work introduces a contemporary layer to the mansion’s historic fabric.


Atlı Köşk'ü Müzenin açık olduğu gün ve saatlerde ziyaret edebilirsiniz:
Visiting days and tickets
You can access the collections and archives of Sakıp Sabancı Museum at digitalSSM.