Background

Dino was born in Istanbul, Ottoman Empire (now Turkey), on March 23, 1913, into an art-loving family.

Education

The first years of his life, Abidin Dino spent with his parents in Geneva, Switzerland and France. They eventually returned to Istanbul in 1925. Dino began his secondary education at the American high school Robert College of Istanbul but ceased his studies in order to entirely devote himself to painting, drawing and writing.

Career

Dino's first articles and cartoons were published in newspapers and magazines. In 1933 he, along with five other young innovative painters, founded the "Group D", which held several exhibitions displaying their artworks. Around that same time, he produced illustrations for Nazım Hikmet’s books of poetry.

In 1933, Sergei Yutkevich, a Soviet director invited Dino to the Lenfil Studios in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). With Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's, the first President of the Republic of Turkey, encouragement Dino accepted this offer. There, he worked as a scenery designer and assistant director at several film studios, and also directed a film called "Miners". Shortly after his return to Turkey, he moved to Paris, where he worked between 1937 and 1939, meeting such famous artists as Tristan Tzara, Gertrude Stein, and Pablo Picasso.

When he moved back to Istanbul, he became a participant of the famous "Harbor Exhibition", comprising of paintings of the city's dockworkers and fishermen by well-known Turkish painters of the time. The exhibition was a public success, and the same year Dino was asked to design the Turkish pavilion at the 1939 New York World's Fair. Concurrently, he published articles and cartoons in several of the foremost magazines of that time, studying a new approach to realism.

During the Second World War, the artist created drawings inspired by the warfare. But the way he treated political subjects in wartime was disliked by the authorities. As a result, the martial law command of Istanbul banished him and his elder brother in 1941 to southeastern Anatolia.

The period of 1941-1945 was artistically very productive for Dino. He worked for a local newspaper, TurkSozu, producing articles and drawings that illustrated the hard lives and working conditions of agricultural labourers in that region. It was in Anatolia that Abidin Dino wrote his plays "Bald" and "Heirs", and began interested in sculpture. In the year 1951, the artist was allowed to leave Turkey. At first, he went first to Rome, Italy where he stayed nine months, and then moved to Paris in 1952.

Within a relatively short period of time, Dino's home in Paris became the stamping-ground of many prominent artists and writers. He first lived in a studio on the top floor of Max Ernst's apartment on the quay of Saint-Michel, and later moved to a small flat in L'Eure. Many of his foreign and also Turkish friends, including Yaşar Kemal, Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar, Nazım Hikmet, and Melih Cevdet, met one another at his home. For eight years starting from 1954, Abidin Dino participated in the "Salon de Mai" exhibitions in Paris.

Abidin Dino visited Turkey in 1969 where he opened an exhibition of his artworks. Later on, he frequently participated in both solo and group exhibitions.

Abidin Dino had two favourite themes in painting: hands and flowers. In a book of small drawings entitled "Guzin's Abidins", which consists of drawings and essays by Abidin Dino, glimpses of the love and sense of solidarity are seen, which were his inspiration.

Achievements

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  Abidin Dino was one of the pioneers of modern Turkish painting. In addition, he also created masterful works in such disparate fields as caricature, cinema, sculpture, ceramics, and literature.
  
  Many artworks by Dino have been sold at auction, including "Untitled", which was sold at Sotheby's London "Contemporary Art Turkish" in 2009 for $52,689.

Works

More photos

• painting

  • Untitled

  • Drawing Pain

  • Nomads, Portrait of a Woman

  • Bloom

  • Madenci

  • unknown title

  • Untitled

  • Drawing

  • Drawing Pain - Self Portrait

  • Bloom

  • Kadin Figuru

  • Abstract Composition

  • Flower

  • unknown title

  • Hand

  • unknown title

  • unknown title

  • Villejuif

  • Saman Sarısı illustration

  • Balık Pazarı

  • Lament/Nomads

  • Antibes

  • Partisans

  • unknown title

  • unknown title

  • Hand and the Eye of Needle

  • unknown title

  • Hands

  • Antibes

  • unknown title

  • Flower

  • Pumpkin

  • Flower

  • unknown title

  • Self-Portrait

  • Flower

  • May 68

  • Uzun Yürüyüş (Long March)

  • Deniz Küstü

  • Yelkenli

  • Soyut Kompozisyon

  • Flower

  • unknown title

  • Hand (Tribute to Ingres)

  • Hand

  • unknown title

  • Portrait

  • Harpooned Man

  • unknown title

  • Flower

  • Vazoda Lale

  • Disasters of War: Evocations of Goya

• poster

  • Legendes a venir

  • Legendes a venir

Personality

Though Abidin Dino lived much time abroad, he never severed relations with Turkey and his friends there. He always took a close interest in everything that occurred in his native country, especially in the political field. He was always glad to cooperate with other writers and artists, writing prefaces and creating illustrations for his friends' books with absolute generosity.

Connections

Abidin Dino was married to Güzin Dino, who was a teacher of French.

Spouse:

Güzin Dino

Güzin Dino was a Turkish literary scholar, linguist, translator and writer.