Geneva hosts pioneer Turkish female photographer's work

By Fatih Erel

GENEVA (AA) - An exhibition featuring the work of Yildiz Moran, the first female Turkish photographer with an academic education, was held Thursday in Geneva, Switzerland on International Women's Day.

A reception was held by the Turkish Consulate-General and was attended by Moran's two sons, Gun and Ongun Arun, Turkish ambassadors, foreign guests and Turkish citizens in Switzerland.

"A very strong and pioneering woman is a leading role model today. We have the honor to exhibit the works of art of the first female Turkish photographer with an academic education, Yildiz Moran," said the Turkish Consul General in Geneva, Mehmet Sait Uyanik, following a celebration of International Women's Day at the reception.

"Yildiz Moran is the first female Turkish photographer with an academic education, and she believed that the camera should be so much a part of one’s being that there should be no barrier between oneself and the subject," said a statement on her official website.

"She was of the opinion that anything of a poetic character is a proper subject of photography and declared that her sole aim was to take photographs containing a certain concept of the topic modified and universalized through the medium of photography," it said.

Moran, who died in 1995, was particularly interested in photographs depicting the life of the Anatolian people.