Semra Germaner (1944-2015)
I had the chance to meet Prof. Dr. Semra Germaner when I was looking for the traces of my name. My father had told me that my name was given to me as a memory of a beloved lady whom my father used to call an ‘older sister’. My father and his beloved older sister had grown up in the same old İstanbul neighbourhood of Beşiktaş.
Ali Teoman Germaner (1924-2018)
All I knew was that she was once a paediatrician and died very young and her brother was a famous sculptor. The famous sculptor’s name was Ali Teoman Germaner. I contacted Professor Germaner and told him that I wanted to meet him and ask him questions about his younger sister Mahan. This was the day I met his wife Semra Germaner who was a warm hearted person and a wonderful host. She had shown me photos of my father’s beloved older sister. I recall a particular photo of a young beautiful girl with big green eyes. She tragically had died very young. Mrs. Germaner promised to send me the photo of Mahan hanım’s childhood. We greeted one another. She signed a book she had recently published about the Orientalists and Constantinople but we never had a chance to meet again.
Semra Germaner (second from the left) in the jury of Contemporary Artists İstanbul Exhibition in 1970s (from Salt Research Archives)
Years later, I learnt that Professor Semra Germaner had passed away.
I wanted to write about this wonderful lady I met years ago and especially about her book titled Constantinople and the Orientalists. Selma Germaner was a graduate of the Department of Painting from the İstanbul State Fine Arts Academy and continued her studies in Sorbonne in the Department of Art History and Contemporary Art in 1968-1973. She had her Phd. from İstanbul Technical University in 1979 from the Department of Architecture. She has been a professor at the Department of Art History in Mimar Sİnan Fine Arts University. Once she said that ‘she had spent fifty years of her life at Mimar Sinan University’. She has been the writer and editor of numerous books but her book Constantinople and the Orientalists is a delight to read even for those of us who are not experts in the field. I would highly recommend it to anyone who wants to learn about how Constantinople has shaped Orientalism which in return shaped our vision of Constantinople!
You can listen to Semra Germaner in this video in which she talks about the transformation of Turkish painting after 1970s.
Here is another video of Semra Germaner in a Conference where she talks about the journey of modernisation in Turkish painting. You will notice her sincerity, her humour as well as her critical gaze of the academia when you watch the video. It is such as pity that video does not have English sub-titles. If you understand Turkish, you should definitely watch it to have a deeper sense of who she was.
Let her rest in peace!
