rusts and ochre

I am fascinated by machinery— anything with dials, switches, red buttons and levers. So naturally, I fell in love with the Museum of Energy at santralistanbul. Santralistanbul was built on the site of the old Silahtarağa Power Plant— the Ottoman Empire's first power plant, which supplied electricity to Istanbul from 1911 to 1983. Reinforced and partly preserved, the museum is a haunting space of rusting machinery and contrasting new metal, wood and concrete.


Connected to the Museum of Energy is the very modern and geometric Main Gallery. While it certainly doesn't blend in with the old plant, somehow the use of raw, exposed metal and smooth concrete works harmoniously. The gallery space is enormous, full of light and minimal— perfect for displaying artwork— and what an exhibit I was about to see!


You'd better run if you want to catch the incredible Yüksel Arslan retrospective— it ends on the 21st of March. I wish I had gone to see these imaginative tea-toned drawings months ago, but better late than never. Over five hundred pieces are on display— which is undeniably impressive, and his expressive linework and gorgeously muted colour palette is drives me wild. A truly unique and inspiring Turkish artist, a great discovery for me.


I might need to use some tea and yellow ochre in my next drawings...

moleskine detour exhibition

Image from Moleskine Detour.

I'll be the only Moly-Xer at the Moleskine Detour Exhibition Opening tomorrow night— an art-filled show show of 50 artists' Moleskines and 30 Mollies from Istanbul Bilgi University, Domus Academy Milano-Roma and myDetour Berlin, held of course, in my fair city of Istanbul.

Detour is a travelling show of creativity contained within the covers of a Moleskine. I've been told that Istanbul City Moleskines were given to students at Bilgi University to fill with drawings, collages, designs and writings of their personal Istanbul. I can't wait to see all the artwork and I'm thrilled to be going to the opening. I'll be there with one of the talented participants, Aslı Aydın, writer of the übercool blog Trendiary, and Ilgin Yorulmaz, editor of the fabulous (and very useful!) Pukka Living, an online guide to unique and hip Istanbul.

The exhibition is being held at santralistanbul from May 22 through June 21,
open from 10 am to 8pm.

*depeche mode*

One of my all-time favourite bands, Depeche Mode, is playing in Istanbul this Thursday night. We are stop number three on their Tour of the Universe, which will pass through 28 European cities. This happens to be the band's first ever stadium tour and I am so there. I bought my ticket yesterday afternoon and have been walking around with a wide grin plastered on my face since. I bought the ticket without knowing where the venue is— that's how excited I was— and now I am figuring out how a girl gets down to santralistanbul on public transport. I believe I can take a free shuttle to santral that leaves from Taksim Square every 20 minutes, but I need to do some more research. I've read that santralistanbul was once an Ottoman power plant in the early 1900s, and has been converted into a museum of energy and some very unique exhibition spaces for art. This one-of-a-kind venue is owned by Bilgi University, one of Turkey's leading universities. I'll try to take some pictures of the place and get some information on it, as it is quite intriguing. Now the question is, what do I wear?

Image was pulled from billetix.com, and phone numbers were removed.
*The concert was cancelled due to David Gahan's sudden attack of gastroenteritis.