Belgin Şahin’s ceramics at ArkeoPea

Şahin, who is a graduate of Robert College and Bosphorus University, began to work in ceramics and sculpture in 1999. Her works, which are products of the endeavors that she carried out in Istanbul in winter and on Bozcaada in the summer, have come together around such themes as women, innocence and the heritage of Anatolia. Şahin, who took up the fate of all Anatolian women in a previous exhibition, says the exhibit represents a higher level in her artistic life. This time she reaches toward universality in forming the pain and wretchedness of the women of Troy from Helen to Hecamede and from Hecuba to Cassandra.

Trojan women
The pain of Trojan women, whose city was burned and destroyed and whose husbands and sons were killed, became one of the leading subjects in world literature. Many plays have been written about these pains, including those of Euripides in 415 B.C.

It’s not just Hecuba, who is the wife of King Priam, or their daughters, Cassandra and Poliksena, and Hector’s wife, Andromache, who are in pain. There are also all the women of the fallen city. Sahin’s ceramic sculptures catch the depths of their pain clearly and sometimes in all its nakedness.

We see them burning and being consumed in fire. We hear the screams from Tenedos as they burn in the Trojan environs. There’s no consolation. Their tears flow hot as they can only hug each other. The great pain of the Trojan women symbolizes the pain that would come afterwards in those same lands. As Virgil said, "Troy burns every night."

The gallery on Yenicarsi Boulevard at Galatasaray is open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays and from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturdays. For more information, call 212 249 92 26.