Pop-Up Kitsch Book Project of Istanbul

Taşı Toprağı Kitsch İstanbul: An Istanbul Guide to Kitsch Identity

Inherited stereotypes of Istanbul are being engraved in our collective memory. We continually produce and convey clichéd discourses.

It is possible to argue that kitsch is the discursive expression of these conventional ideas which we call clichés. In that, Istanbul becomes a rich source of kitsch with its streets, language, history and architecture, in its entirety. Questioning the ordinariness and discursiveness of these stereotypes of expressions can reflect the kitschness of such condition.

To start from these idea, to observe a city based on these concepts shows that the points with different features in the city have various kitsch identities in themselves; approaching different points of Istanbul from this perspective has emerged the idea of collecting the kitsch elements of urban identity in a book.

An identity of the city was done in the context of kitsch via explorational tours in İstanbul. Pictures were taken. These pictures were transformed into three dimensional moving pages in this book.