Osmanlı Fotoğraflarında İmgenin ve Temsilin Değişimi 1908-1914

Abstract

This study primarily examines how the political changes in the Ottoman Empire between 1908, when the Second Constitutional Monarchy was proclaimed, and the Empire's entry into World War I in 1914, impacted Ottoman visual culture, specifically in the field of photography, and how the purposes and content of photography evolved during this period. With the declaration of the Second Constitutional Monarchy, the constitutional order was re-established, and a parliamentary system was introduced. Reforms were implemented in the political, social, and economic spheres, alongside developments in areas such as press freedom and freedom of expression. As a result, photography began to appear more frequently in newspapers and magazines, becoming more accessible to the public. Simultaneously, during this tumultuous period, which marked the final years of the Ottoman Empire characterized by political instability, civil unrest, and wars the use of photographs with new themes in newspapers and magazines became increasingly widespread. The objective of this study is to analyze the changing forms of photographic imagery and representation in relation to the political, social, and cultural dynamics of the period, which facilitated these changes, by examining the emergence of new subject types and their underlying causes. As part of the research, photographs from the 1908-1914 issues of Servet-i Fünun, Şehbal, and Resimli Kitab the leading periodicals of the time reflecting the political and cultural atmosphere as well as the visual culture of the era alongside photographs from the 1908-1914 issues of L'Illustration, a prominent international publication, were scanned and categorized according to their content using content analysis. Through this approach, while tracing the changes in photographic imagery and representation, the study aims to uncover the significant role photography played in producing meaning and conveying it as a tool, based on the photographs featured in these publications.