Ara Güler Archive Series - Istanbul's Ferries

Everything is there in these photographs: the children on the shore and on the landing stages; the boatmen of the Golden Horn; those Şehir Hatları steamers, all of whose names we knew by heart- both those that plied the Bosphorus and those that made their way between the banks of fhe Golden Horn (to which we hurried down from fhe surrounding heights); the ever-changing scene on the Galata Bridge, and the way the sea looked when we stood on it; the caulking yards; the men who put out the gangways for boarding and alighting passengers; the loafers standing and staring at the sea; and the matelots making use of their shore leave. Dear lstanbul, it is not solely from poets that we learn who and what you are: it is equally from masters of the photographic art such as Ara Güler. lndeed, no vestige of the past, no monument, no work of art is capable of teaching people what Istanbul was like for our generition as effecfively as Ara Güler does. İlber Ortaylı