REFERENCES ON TURHAN SELÇUK’S ART
After a short time the new wave spread globally and developed in the hands of the masters in Italy, England, and Germany.
Cemal Nadir, the great caricature master of the old school, had already deceased before the novelty brought about by Steinberg. A new generation of young people around the age of 20 or so were coming along to fill the gap left by him.
One of these youngersters would stand out and be one of the leaders who would bring Steinberg’s so-called revolution to our country. His name was Turhan Selçuk.
Turhan readily adopted this contempoary school of caricature. No one could guess that he would succeed against the locally established practices of the Turkish market. No one believed that he could win the Turkish public with “humor in lines”. Yet, he did. Working within the scope of the new caricature, he applied all that is new as far as the content and style is concerned and was admired greatly and became popular.
He was famous almost instantly worldwide.
ABDİ İPEKÇİ, 1959
Turhan Selçuk’s mastery goes far beyond the mimicry of a stylist. He’s got that rare sensitivity of a satirist and play-writer which reaches out to that level of intellectual superiority and refinement.
Simple lines, which may even look not so attractive or meaningful at first sight, eventually gain momentum of thematic sensitivity, and achieve that twist of wisdom, both of which are irreplaceable characteristics of his work. Turhan also managed to stay humoristic without being funny.
On the other hand, he also managed to stay away from that “intellectual” approach which tries to “intellectualize” the art of humor, actually degenerating it.
SEZER TANSUĞ, Güldiken, 1994
One can easily say that his caricatures make one deliciously dizzy. The inherent quality of humor hidden in the lines (the imagery of ideas) is translated into an esthetic expression, which in turn comes out as a mysteriously sensuous understanding; thus shared and re-affirmed, the end result defines itself with that particular pleasure which is self-explanatory only.
That’s why Turhan’s caricatures are not short-lived. They have that inherent quality of attraction and charm based on pictorial esthetics. The humor with which they define themselves is so intellectually challenging that we wonder and fall victim to the search of that dynamics. His creations are esthetically so masterful and humoristic that they are fully aware of the consciousness of our present age and yet retain that superb quality of refinement and coolness. He’s unique.
OHANNES ŞAŞKAL, Güldiken, 1994
Cem, Cemal Nadir and Turhan make up the magic golden triangle of the Turkish caricature; they have brought together all the ends of the Turkish caricature together and have carried it beyond the city’s or the country’s borders to the world’s peoples.
TURGUT ÇEVİKER, Güldiken, 1994
