Osman Köker presents exhibition of historic postcards documenting lives of Armenians in Ottoman Empire

February 8, 2011 - 10:53 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - Turkish author and publisher Osman Köker presented his exhibition of historic postcards documenting the lives of Armenians throughout the Ottoman Empire in 1900-1910 at the Glendale Public Library Auditorium.

The program was organized by The National Association for Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR), Organization of Istanbul Armenians, Ararat-Eskijian Museum (AEM), and Project Save Armenian Photograph Archives and is sponsored by Glendale Public library.

Köker first came to international attention in 2005, when he organized an unprecedented exhibition, titled “Sireli Yeghpayrs (My Dear Brother),” in Istanbul. Eventually seen by thousands of people, it presented photographs of Armenian life in pre-genocide Ottoman Turkey, drawn from a large collection of postcards owned by the collector Orlando Calumeno. In the five years since then, the exhibition has also been mounted in Paris, Munich, Koln, Frankfurt, and last year in Yerevan.

Köker originally intended to write a book about Armenian life in the Ottoman Empire, but with the discovery of the postcard collection the scope of the project changed. Following the exhibition he published the massive and beautifully-produced volume 100 Yýl Önce Türkiye’de Ermeniler, subsequently published in English as Armenians in Turkey 100 Years Ago, featuring hundreds of images showing where and how Armenians in the Ottoman Empire lived.

Osman Köker was also involved in the creation in 1996 of the Istanbul Turkish-Armenian daily Agos and Aras Publishing House, the only publishing house which publishes books in Armenian and books translated into Turkish from the Armenian, Asbarez.com reported.