Ernst Arnold Egli

At its core The Garden of (Not) Forgetting is a project we have committed to maintaining about the Alfred Helbronn Botanic Garden and its founders. It is a semi- biographical exhibition and research project that focuses on spaces and plants while incorporating archives and stories. The text you are reading contains the data we obtained during the course of our research and represents a suggestion regarding how to interpret the current decision to move the garden.

Throughout this text each social transformation will be pursued through the spatial fractures that took place on this land. The state of destroying to make others forget, and constructing to set the foundations for a new memory, will both be examined through the case of the Alfred Heilbronn Botanic Garden and its grounds. Chronologically this text will move from the Ottoman Empire to the present following the use of the space as the Ağakapısı (Agah Gate: official residence of the chief of the Janissary Corps), Bab-ı Meşihat (the seat of the Muftiate), the Istanbul Girls High School, and the Istanbul University Biology Department building. We also will give details regarding the concurrent social and political conditions. Finally, we will share information about current decisions to move and demolish the space.

During the early years of the Turkish Republic, modern architecture became an active tool in the representation of the bourgeois ideal of domes-ticity. The most significant component of the new Turkish family was the image of the " republican woman " as a nationally-constructed icon. By comparatively examining Ernst Egli's İsmet Paşa Girls' Institute (1930) and Ankara Girls' High School (1936) with Margarete Schütte-Lihotz-ky's unbuilt annex project for the latter (1938) this paper argues that girls' technical schools and girls' high schools contributed to the making of this much idealized image in considerably different ways. Such diversity enabled the governing elite in Turkey to make a class-based and spatially constructed categorization of women as economic actors: enlightened housewives specialized in one of the so-called " female arts " and upper-class professional women who would participate in public life. It is further argued that this categorization allowed Schütte-Lihotzky, in her design for the unbuilt high school annex in Ankara, to rework the broader " redomestication " issues which marked her earlier career in Weimar Germany.

Presenting the main idea behind the development model of the Republic of Turkey, Atatürk Orman Çiftliği is a premises which defined and design on a small scale the scope and quality of a “modernity project” with all details from the location to its construct of agriculture, industry, production and entertainment while setting an example as a state initiative.
Atatürk Orman Çiftliği is a modern premises model designed by Swiss Architect Ernst Arnold Egli within the scope of culture, education and architecture policies of Early Republic Period (1923 – 1950), distinguishing itself from many public buildings built in Ankara while he was living in the Turkish capital. One of the buildings of the premises, Beer Factory Bath is part of a complex designed with the Factory and houses. Although Egli stayed true to the characteristic plan of the Ottoman bath, he adopted the International Architecture trends of 1930’s in materials and techniques. It is considered that his expression of his architecture legacy that is, in his words, “independent from time and not bound by the trends of his time” found meaning in the Beer Factory Bath through the synthesis that he tried to achieve with the modern materials and techniques.
The article is focused on the story of structuring of ‘Beer Factory Bath’ as a modern premises model,  recited by Ernst Egli within the content of Gazi Orman Çiftliği designs having a significant place in the city’s collective memory. Using the original written and visual documents, it was intended to introduce and review Egli’s efforts to create an impact establishing a bond between the Turkish culture and history, how he interpreted and implemented the perceived duties of architecture, and the general design plan and distribution of functions.

The city of Hyderabad in Pakistan was widely known as manghan jo shaharu, the city of the wind catchers. In the second half of the 20th century, these wind catchers became part of a modern iconography of the winds. Since images have been published in Bernard Rudofsky’s influential book Architecture without Architects in 1964, the roofscape with its scores of wind catchers has repeatedly appeared in publications on architecture and the ecology movement. The recurring reference to the roofscape shown by Rudofsky has imbued these images with a twofold reference character which follows the interpretation of Hyderabad that was created by the New York MoMA exhibit. Rudofsky’s exhibit and exhibition catalog have constituted the framework for an interpretation of the circulating images of Hyderabad’s roofscape ever since. By tracing the photographic tradition of Hyderabad’s wind catchers, this article reveals the historical character of this motif and thus an allegorical concept of the relationship between architecture and environment which, given today’s focus on sustainability, is becoming increasingly important. “Nature,” says Walter Benjamin, “has always been allegorical,” thus anticipating an insight of contemporary science and technology studies (STS). A rereading of the interpretational approaches to the wind catchers reveals the questionable character of the one-sided transfer of modern energy and technology concepts onto architectural forms that originated in different historical contexts. An allegorical interpretation of the wind catchers may help to recognize vernacular forms of knowledge as mediated and as circulating on a global scale. Illustrations of wind catchers in modern architectural publications tell us as much about the energy societies in Europe and the U.S. as about the vernacular thermal forms of knowledge in Pakistan. Beyond the cultural, the sculptural, and the technological interpretation of the wind catchers, the motif directs our eye to a general solution for the entire city, which is gaining importance in today’s reflections on urban forms of energy supply. The task of cooling is transferred from the building scale to the urban scale and from high to everyday culture.

Erken Cumhuriyet Dönemi (1923-1950) mimarlık ortamı, Cumhuriyet yönetiminin siyasi ve kültürel yönelimlerini açıkça ortaya koyan etkili bir dile sahiptir. Bu ortamda özellikle 1930’lar boyunca uygulanan Uluslararası Mimarlık Üslubu’nun Türkiye’ye yerleşmesinde Almanca konuşulan ülkelerden gelen mimarların önemli katkıları olmuştur. Bu mimarlardan İsviçreli Ernst Egli, özellikle başkent Ankara’daki çok sayıda tasarımı, eğitimci ve yönetici kimliği ile bu “modern” üslubun öncülerinden birisidir. Egli, Cumhuriyet yönetiminin titizlikle ve özenle ele aldığı ve açıkça prestij sembolü olarak gördüğü eğitim yapıları alanında önemli çalışmalar yapmıştır. Milli Eğitim Bakanlığı İnşaat Bürosu yöneticiliği, İstanbul Güzel Sanatlar Akademisi Mimarlık Şubesi yöneticiliği ve eğitimciliği ile başta eğitim yapıları olmak üzere Ankara’daki önemli kamu binalarının tasarım ve uygulamaları sözkonusu çalışmalar arasındadır. Makalemizde Ernst Egli’nin Türkiye’deki çalışmalarında belirginleşen mimarlık anlayışı ile 1936 yılında tasarımını ve yapımını gerçekleştirdiği Siyasal Bilgiler Okulu Binası özellikle Eidgenössichen Technischen Hochschule Zürich (ETHZ) Arşivi’nden elde edilen özgün belgeler ile tanıtılmış ve değerlendirilmiştir. Uluslararası Mimarlık Üslubunun Cumhuriyet’in “modernlik”ten beklentilerini nasıl karşıladığı, Siyasal Bilgiler Okulu binasında bu biçim dilinin nasıl kullanıldığı ve yapının başkentin mimari estetiğine nasıl bir katkı sağladığı bu makalenin ana tartışmasıdır. Makalede önce Erken Cumhuriyet Dönemi mimarlık ortamının 1920’ler ve 1930’lar kesiti kısaca ele alınmıştır. Daha sonra Ernst Egli’nin Türkiye’deki çalışmaları ve mimarlık anlayışı tanıtılmıştır. Ardından Egli’nin Ankara’daki önemli uygulamalarından olan Siyasal Bilgiler Okulu binası ele alınmış, son bölümde ise yapı, Ernst Egli mimarlığı ve Erken Cumhuriyet Dönemi Mimarlığı bağlamında değerlendirilmiştir.

Istanbul University, Institute of Biology (currently known as Botany Division), designed with a functionalist style by Swiss-Austrian architect Ernst Egli, was built in 1935 in Süleymaniye. The Institute and (Alfred Heilbronn) Botanical Garden were of great importance to meet necessary technical and architectural aspects of contemporary biology education for the first time in Turkey. The land on which the institute was founded, where Ağa Gate, Bab-ı Meşihat and old Istanbul Girls' High School were located before, has become an important part of the 20th century modern architectural heritage by having a place in the memory of the city with events, structures, people and plants, which emerged under the influence of social and political dynamics in the Republic period. The Institute of Biology located in the ‘Süleymaniye Mosque and its Associated Component Area’, which were inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1985, is currently on the agenda as a controversial subject due to the evacuation of the Division and Botanical Garden and their allocation to the Istanbul’s Mufti's Office. This study draws attention to the historical values and current potentials of the building and garden on the basis of preserving the modern architectural heritage.

Çok yönlü kişiliği ve modern mimari üslubundaki tasarımları ile tanınan Egli'nin özellikle Ankara’daki eğitim binalarındaki üretimlerine, Viyana günlerindeki bilimsel çalışmalarına , müzik, resim, şiir gibi sanatsal alanlara ilgisine, dolayısıyla entelektüel tarafına ve son olarak Türk kadınının seçme ve seçilme hakkına sahip olmasının İsviçre’de neden uygulamaya konmadığını sorgulamasına dair bir yazısına odaklanan bir çalışmadır.

Özet: Botanik bahçeleri, içinde canlı bitki koleksiyonlarının yer aldığı, bilimsel bir ekip tarafından yönetilen ve eğitimli personeller tarafından bakım ve kontrollerin yapıldığı, eğitim ve araştırma amaçlı kurulmuş mekanlardır. Türkiye'de resmi olarak botanik alanında çalışmalar yapan ve bitki varlığı yönünden zengin en eski botanik bahçesi, Osmanlı döneminde tarihi bir değer taşıyan eski Ağa Kapısı'nın yer aldığı arazide kurulan Alfred Heilbronn Botanik Bahçesi'dir. Cumhuriyet reformları ve yeni eğitim politikaları çerçevesinde ülkemize davet edilen yabancı akademisyenlerden biri olan Prof. Dr. Alfred Heilbronn ve arkadaşlarının desteği ile 1935 yılında kurulan İstanbul Üniversitesi'ne ait Botanik Bahçesi, günümüzde tahliye edilme tehdidiyle karşı karşıyadır. Bu metinde, modern mimari miras kapsamında değerlendirilen bahçenin kültür varlığı olarak korunması gerekliliği; bahçenin kuruluşu, yerleşim planı ve sahip olduğu bitki varlığı hakkında derlenen bilgiler doğrultusunda vurgulanmıştır.

Abstract: The botanical gardens are places that contain living plant collections managed by a scientific team and maintained by trained personnel, established for educational and research purposes. in Turkey, Alfred Heilbronn Botanical Garden is the oldest botanical garden, which works in the field of botany officially and abounds in plant species. it was established on the site of the old Aga Gate, which had a historical value during the Ottoman period. Within the framework of the Republican reforms and new educational policies, the botanical garden was founded in 1935 by the cooperative work of Prof. Dr. Alfred Heilbronn, one of the foreign academicians who was invited to Turkey, and his colleagues. Today, the botanical garden is faced with the thread of eviction. in this paper, the necessity of the preservation of the botanical garden as a cultural property within the scope of modern architectural heritage is indicated through the information compiled about the establishment of the garden, its settlement plan and different plant species.

Esra Akcan’s Architecture in Translation is a study in the remarkable migrations of modern architecture from Central Europe’s German-speaking lands to Turkey. Extrapolating from a linguistic metaphor, Akcan calls what transpired from the mid-1920s to the mid-1940s “architecture in translation.” The author’s insight that the modern house and housing are two of the most contested constructs of the German and Turkish architecture, and the way she locates architecture within the linguistic debates concerning translation in Turkey at the time, are brilliant. The historical material presented in this book, the extensive archival work, and the author’s ambition to devise a theory of translation, make it indispensable reading for anyone interested in the international experience of the Modern movement.

Key words: Architectural modernism; Translation in architecture; German and Turkish exchange in architecture; Turkish modernism; the Garden City movement; Hermann Jansen; Plan for Ankara; Weimar Germany’s modernist social housing projects (Siedlungen); Clemens Holzmeister; Ernst Egli; Martin Wagner; Bruno Taut; Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky; Wilhelm Lihotzky; Paul Bonatz; Sedad Eldem; the Turkish house; Cosmopolitan architecture; Seyfi Arkan; the post-structuralist theory in architecture; Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and her influence.