Halay Theme in Contemporary Turkish Painting

Abstract

In Turkish culture, halay is a ceremonial dance/game whose roots extend back to the periods before Christ and even to prehistoric times. Halay is still playing in ceremonies held at wedding, engagement, henna night and religious/official holidays, in all kinds of social practice like birthday, military farewell, etc. in modern Anatolia. It is seen that many features including the halay playing figures and the handkerchiefs hold by head of the halay and the drum, which are found in Central Asia and Anatolia in the rock paintings belonging to the years before Christ, are exactly like to the ones played in Anatolia today. This shows that an ancient cultural heritage is kept alive in the Anatolian folk culture without change. The first article about Halay(folk dances) written in 1900 in Turkey. However, with the establishment of the Republic, the importance given to the folk culture increased and carried out various field studies by the intellectuals. In the art of painting, the first examples about halay began to be seen in the works of painters who participated in the country tours organized between 1938 and 1943. For this reason, the subject of this research was restricted to the works of Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu, İbrahim Balaban, Mustafa Esirkuş, Nuri Abaç, Kayıhan Keskinok, Mehmet Pesen, Necdet Kalay, Rauf Tuncer and Saim Dursun who have halay theme in their works. Stable attitudes of these artists have been a reference for their preference. In addition, because of the absence of any research on the reflections of halay in Turkish painting, it was thought that the research would make a significant contribution to the related literature. Qualitative research methods and techniques were used in the research.