CULTURE-TURKEY: Cartoons in Handcuffs

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Nadire Mater

ISTANBUL, Aug 6 1996 (IPS) - An arrow points the way to Ertan Aydin’s exhibition in the Sultanahmet district here. Above it there is a sign bearing words as eye-catching as the works being displayed: “Handcuffed cartoons”.

The physical location of the exhibition — in the historic Yerebatan cistern, a silent, cool, dilmy-lit setting dating back to the Byzantine era — stands in sharp contrast to the startling images of violence, brutality, injustice and torture reflected in the Turkish cartoonist’s work.

A message from the artist is posted at the entrance.

“Dear friends, I regret, due to unavoidable circumstances, I am unable to join you at such a happy moment.” It is signed “From Ertan Aydin, with love”. The card is attached to a bunch of flowers.

These “unavoidable circumstances” are well known to Turks: the young cartoonist is in jail. He is expected to complete a four- month prison term in August. And such is his record that his release will be just an interlude — time before the next imprisonment.

Two more cases against him await final decision in the State Security Court, which has twice condemned the artist. Aydin completed his first jail term in September 1995. He was jailed a second time in April 1996. Those who know him say the artist is likely to continue his artistic life on a roller-coaster.

Aydin fell on the wrong side of the law when he drew a cartoon about the seizure of the books of sociologist Ismail Besikci by the police during a 1994 book fair in Istanbul. That cartoon was titled: “It is the police, anything goes with it” — a variation of a Turkish saying “he is a lunatic, anything goes with him.”

Aydin’s two ongoing cases are based on charges that he “defamed the police”. In one of his cartoons a kennel is shown with the inscription “Attention, police” written on it.

The cartoonist has been strongly defended.

“Even if the authors and artists might be confined behind prison walls, convictions and creations cannot be imprisoned,” says Turhan Selcuk, a prominent Turkish cartoonist, in a speech to the opening of Aydin’s exhibition.

Recalling that cartoonist Asaf Kocak was among 36 intellectuals killed in 1993 when a hotel was set afire during a riot started by fundamentalists, Selcuk said: “They are all torches of freedom, burnt in order to enlighten our country.” He invited the public to see the “unconfinable” cartoons of Aydin.

Selcuk, a veteran in the trade, has had his share of controversy. He was condemned during the 1950s at the height of the Cold War for representing the communist symbol — the “hammer and sickle” — in one of his works.

The weekly humour magazine ‘Dolmus’, for whom Selcuk was then working, declared bankruptcy and closed under the burden of fines imposed by the courts. Selcuk’s works were largely responsible for this pressure.

Officials of the Cartoonists Association say its members have been under pressure for a long time. During the 1940s, when the country was under single party rule, pressure was so heavy several publications closed down or changed their names every week to avoid prosecution.

Multi-party system came, and the cartoonists still had problems: in the 1950s, the late cartoonist Ratip Tahir Burak was tried on 54 separate charges.

Condemning cartoonists is one thing. Making the charges stick is not easy. Burak himself was acquitted of 53 charges. Yet he could not escape the 54th one for which he had been condemned to 16 months.

Humour magazines are generally charged with violating laws against “separatism” and with defaming the police or with obscenity, the association officials say.

“Bringing lawsuits against cartoonists is itself a matter of humour,” says lawyer Fikret Ilkiz, who has defended many cartoonists. “Although many cartoonists are prosecuted, when compared with writers they are relatively in a better position. There is always an escape for them.”

Prominent cartoonist Ismail Gulgec is an example. In a cartoon he had drawn for daily ‘Evrensel’ in 1995, Gulgec made his favourite character “intellectual bear” comment on the state of his life: “I am so happy that we are ruled by beasts”.

The prosecutor indicted Gulgec, saying he had defamed Turkey’s rulers, though judges accepted his defense that the “beasts” implied the directors of the newspaper not rulers of Turkey.

Recalling late Turkish president Turgut Ozal, who was reputed by the media for his “utmost tolerance for cartoonists” Ilkiz says that during his reign Ozal had himself took out lawsuits against at least 500 cartoons.

However, “the same Ozal who ordered prosecution of cartoonists would also want them to sign their originals for him,” says Ilkiz. “Although the politicians are expected to be more tolerant than the man on the street, they are never like this. Maybe this is because sometimes a cartoon may be more effective than a column.”

Ilkiz, a lawyer for the Istanbul daily ‘Cumhuriyet’, says the newspaper’s cartoonist Musa Kart was also prosecuted recently.

Kemal Gokhan, a prominent cartoonist, who has also been sued by late president Ozal believes cartoonists “have their own judgments” and that the cartoon is itself “the aesthetic expression of judgments”.

“Turkey provides abundant material for a critical cartoonist,” says Gokhan. “And the situation of cartoonists itself is a very good subject. For instance a colleague, Guneri Icoglu, has been condemned to 10 months because one of his characters had said ‘Turks are bum’.”

Ahmet Erkanli, another cartoonist from Istanbul, is awaiting his time in jail. He is condemned for a cartoon he had drawn for the Istanbul monthly ‘Tavir’. In that work a court hearing is depicted. The plaintiff complains: “In the southeast they force us to eat s—.” The judge responds: “You cannot occupy the paramount court with such s—.”

Erkanli’s cartoon might imply a recently concluded case involving security force officers and Kurdish villagers. The villagers brought the case before the European Human Rights Court who found the Turkish security force officers guilty and fined the Turkish government.

However a local Turkish court found cartoonist Erkanli guilty of defaming Turkish justice and condemned him to 10 months in May 1995.

“I have heard that Aydin was jailed for his cartoons,” says university student Cigdem Piraye from Istanbul. “He has been jailed but his works are here. This is his world of criticism and art and we can still hear what he wanted to say.”