Anatolian city polishes up for term as cultural capital

The 2013 Turkic World Capital of Culture will be the central Anatolian city of Eskisehir, a "city of students" that has been gaining popularity in recent years for its nightclubs and revival of cultural life. "We want to create new structures in the city that will remind people that the city was a capital of culture in 30 or even 40 years. One of these structures is an open-air museum, which will be the first of its kind in Turkey," said Eskisehir Mayor Kadir Kocdemir. He said the city had been preparing for the year 2013 with three major themes. One is "promotion," Kocdemir said. "Our goal is the promotion of Eskisehir in Turkey and of Turkey in the Turkic world. When we go to various countries in the Turkic world we see that Turkey’s contribution to these regions is not well-known. This should be remedied. Likewise, Eskisehir should also be promoted there." Kocdemir said the second theme would be "events." "Masters of culture and arts who have made contributions to Turkish cultural heritage will go to Turkic-world countries and those from the Turkic world will come to Eskisehir. They will exhibit their artworks. Operas, ballet troupes, photography groups, journalists and literary figures will come to the city." The third theme will be "permanent artwork," which the mayor said was especially important to them. "We want to finish the restoration of cultural and natural pieces before 2013. All these creations are normally done in eight to 10 years. We have already done the feasibility work." One of the new developments is an open-air museum that will be the first of its kind in Turkey. "Open-air museums are very popular in Europe. Most of the top 10 most popular museums are open-air museums. The museum will display everything relating to daily life, such as pots and pans, personal belongings etc. In this museum we will display life between 1900 and 1950 and things belonging to daily life during this time. In other words, farmers will drive plows and forge iron, women will wash clothes with clay and so on. The museum will show all these objects. Of course, various events will also be organized at the museum."