[accessibleimage] Esref Armagon
- From: Lisa Yayla <fnugg@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: accessibleimage@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, Access to Art Museums <artbeyondsightmuseums@xxxxxxxxxx>, art_beyond_sight_learning_tools@xxxxxxxxxx, art_beyond_sight_advocacy@xxxxxxxxxx, art_beyond_sight_educators@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, art_beyond_sight_theory_and_research@xxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 08 May 2007 11:43:01 +0200
Article excerpt from the Turkish Daily News
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=72370
Colors of darkness
Saturday, May 5, 2007
Esref Armagan, a Turkish painter, has been blind since his birth. He has
never seen the green of a tree, the red of a rose or the blue of the
sky. He has always wondered what the world looks like and has learned it
through the paintings he himself created. ?I see now. Painting has shown
me the world,? says Armagan.
ISTANBUL ? Tempo Magazine
Mr. Armag(gan, 54, does not use a brush while he is painting. He touches
and feels the nature and reflects it to the canvas by using his fingers.
Armagan has been painting since the age of 12. He is the winner of
numerous awards both in Turkey and abroad, including the United States,
China and Europe. An American friend of Armagan, Joan Eroncel,
introduced him to the world. Eroncel, whom Armagan met in 1994, says
that he is a genius. ?The only Turkish painter whose pieces are
exhibited in the Museum of Modern Art and Metropolitan Museum in New
York is Esref Armagan. He is the pride of Turkey.?
Armag(an has no academic qualification in arts. However, he can draw
famous architectural artworks from different perspectives. We admired
his ?finger prints? on the canvas.
Married with two children, Armagan is living in Ankara. Blind from the
birth, Armag(an became curious about his environment at the age of
six. ?For instance,? he says, ?I thought watermelons grow on trees, but
they are on the ground.? He learned the names and colors of everything
in the environment and memorized them. ?I had the freedom to examine
objects in my hand,? added Armag(an.
?When we were together with friends, I asked them to describe the
scenery for me.? At the age of 12-13, Armag(an thought, ?I wonder if I
can draw everything that I have asked about?? then he examined reliefs,
learned the shapes of houses, mountains and trees. ?I placed cardboard
under the photographs in newspapers and asked people to use a hard
pencil and draw them for me. After I checked them with my fingers, my
brain started to sense them. I learned all colors and shapes and
memorized them.?
When Armag(an was 12, he started by drawing by pencil. His first drawing
was a butterfly. Later he switched to oil painting. However, he did not
use brushes. ?If you are blind you do not understand if you are dipping
the brush in the paint or if it has enough paint on, or if you paint the
canvas. So, I started painting by my fingers. I have never seen the
colors but I learned to use them,? Armag(an explained...................
.............On the footsteps of Brunelleschi ? with no vision
They took me to a square in Italy. Professor Kennedy from Harvard was
there too. We were standing in front of the artwork of the Italian
architect Filippo Brunelleschi who lived 600 years ago and invented the
three-way perspective. They gave me five minutes to examine the model of
the building. Then, they told me, ?You will draw an image of this piece
by viewing from the front, the rear and from the top,? described
Armag(an. After I drew the three-perspective piece, I heard Professor
Kennedy crying. He said, ?Today is a historic day. Brunelleschi drew the
three-way perspective for the first time 600 years ago. The first man
with no vision drawing with the same perspective is Es,ref Armag(an.?
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