Another Day in ARTS-IN ISTANBUL

[İlknur Akman]

Well...It's been a while that we, four of us, didn't come together at the gallery. We all had our reasons... First of all Türkan's brother, who lives in Izmir, had an operation and Türkan was naturally busy to take care of the patient and the rest of the family. Hilal, who has a very talented son, is always busy, she runs here and there to keep everything in order. She was at the gallery on Tuesday BUT I was not there... I had a ''GIRLS BREKFAST'' at my best friends house, with 5 other friends, so I couldn't join ARTS-IN team. Meral, the motivator, is most of the time at the gallery. She lives on one of the islands of Istanbul and she spends a lot of time at the gallery. Now that we have our MAIL ART EXHIBITION, she comes to ARTS-IN 4 days a week. 
These three ladies I mentioned above are the founders of this art heaven. Apart from them, we have other friends who share the place with us. Like Gülcan for example... She is a very good oil painter... Then there is Öznur, whose collages are the best; she will give us a course on monochrome painting next week.
Every Tuesday and Thursday we, the ARTS-IN artists, meet at the gallery. We work together, we talk, laugh and share the best time of our lives. We learn a lot from books, from art works which arrive from all over the world and especially from each other. I feel very lucky to be with them sharing this wonderful atmosphere.
Well, honestly speaking my last few days are gone reading a lot about watercolor techniques.  I always dreamed of doing nice sketches and coloring them with watercolors. BUT, I am terrible!!! I am definitely the worst watercolor-lover of the history of mankind!!! I should give it up BUT I simply can't!!! That's my dream!!! I always envied those people who sit in a quite corner in one of the mighty temples of, for example, BAGAN in MYANMAR and start to do some quick sketches and then add some colors here and there easily... I am not one of them!!! I struggle...But with watercolor, you shouldn't struggle... You should set yourself free and just do it! BUT I can't let myself go! I try!!! And I try... No way!!! But one day I'll do it! Hopefully in this lifetime:)

[Turkan Elci]

Ayrıca hakkımızda çok güzel vede çok espirili şeyler yazmışsın.Seni seviyoruz

[Turkan Elci]

İlknu'cugum harikasın

[Katerina Nikoltsou (MomKat)]

Merhaba Ilknur...make a visit to Topkapi, sit in one of the gardens, 

sketch with a "bic" pen, and then just "wash" some watercolor across it.

It's a good beginning...and Istanbul has soooo many beautiful "corners" to paint :-)