Aynı Rüyanın İçinde - Ara Güler & Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

“Ara Güler’in İstanbul fotoğraflarında fotoğrafçı (Ara Güler) ile fotoğrafı çekilen (İstanbul) arasında, beylik deyimle bir aşk ilişkisi görmek mümkündür. Fotoğraflara bakan daha dikkatli bir göz ise, bu ilişkinin sadece aşk ile kısıtlı olmadığını görecektir. Ara Güler, doğup büyüdüğü kente yalnızca aşk ile değil; tutkuyla, kıskançlıkla, öfkeyle, şefkatle, sevdayla, bellekle, yaşanmış her saniyesinin, her ışık huzmesinin üstüne titreyen bir sevgiyle, hiçbir ayrıntıyı gözardı etmeyen bir dikkatle bakıyordur. Kent ile (bu İstanbul kentiyle) Ara Güler arasındaki ilişkidir söz konusu.” Memet Baydur

'' In Ara Güler's photographs of Istanbul, one can discern the existence of a powerful love relationship - the use a somewhat hackneyed phrase - between the photographer (Ara Güler) and the subject being photographer (Ara Güler) and the subject being photographed (Istanbul). On closer examination, however, we will see that there is a great deal more to this relationship than just love and affection: Ara Güler looks on the city in which he was born and bred not only with these feelings, but also with passion, with a jealous possesivennes, even with anger - and at the same time with sympathy, compassion and an intense longing sparked off by his memories. He is determined not just to cherish every moment of experience, but also to capture everything contained within it - every single ray of light - with a caring meticulousness that does not permit a single detail to pass unnoticed. The photograph express, in its totality, the complex relationship between the city - Istanbul - and Ara Güler.'' Memet Baydur

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 the Golden Horn (to which we hurried down from the 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 generation as effectively as Ara Güler does. İlber Ortaylı