Sunder Erdoğan
Sunder Erdoğanis a local artist possessing not one but two interesting talents; he is a model boat builder and caricaturist. Sunder was raised in the Fener-Balat district of Istanbul and first came to Kaş in 1990. He likes to reminisce about the variety of customs and cultures in his ancient home district. However, he really becomes animated when he speaks about his work as a caricaturist and model boat builder.
You can see some caricatures and model ships built by Sunder on this Facebook Photo Album
Sunder and Ülkü Erdoğan
Sunder and his wife Ülkü, who is an exhibiting painter, left Istanbul for Kaş in 1998. They now live in Gökseki just a few kilometres outside of Kaş.
When Sunder and Ülkü first came to Kaş in 1990, the place they usually stayed was the AntePhellos pension. The Phellos hotel and most of the hotels in that part of Kaş had not yet been built. Kaş was just a large village at the time.
Sunder was born in November 1952 in the Fener-Balat district of Istanbul and lived there until he was 10 years old. When he lived in Fener-Balat it had a very mixed ethnic population. There were Laz fishermen whose origins were from the Black Sea region, there were, and are still many Sephardic Jewish people, many of whom still speak a language called Ladino, and of course synagogues. The “Rum” or Orthodox Greeks lived there and it is the location of a famous Fener Greek school for boys. Fener-Balat is also where the cast iron Bulgarian Church of Saint Stephen is located.
Fener-Balat at one time was primarily a Jewish community, populated first by Jewish emigres from the Balkans and European persecution and later by Jews escaping the Spanish edict of Ferdinand and Isabella in 1492 where they were to convert to Catholicism or die. Sultan Bayezid II allegedly ordered a flotilla of ships to bring them from Spain to the Ottoman territories. “At midnight August 2, 1492, when Columbus embarked on what would become his most famous expedition to the New World, his fleet departed from the relatively unknown seaport of Palos because the shipping lanes of Cadiz and Seville were clogged with Sephardic Jews expelled from Spain by the Edict of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain.“
Sunder Erdoğan Early published book
In 1972, still a young boy, Sunder drew copies of old comics from historical events. As a young man, and upon the advice of a friend, Sunder took his drawings under his arm and went to Avrupa Produksiyon Servisi (APS), an agency in Beyoğlu. The owner, who became his mentor encouraged Sunder to draw caricatures. He also experimented with animations and comics. His mentor also advised him to find himself an “usta” or master to copy. Sunder thought about Turkish master caricaturists famous at that time, like Altan Erbulak or Turhan Selcuk but they would not take him as student. So he found a Belgian named Herve and with the advice of his new boss, he copied his caricatures many, many times until he got a feel for the style of the master. Later, with the help of his mentor, he developed his own style.
Sunder Erdoğan Published Book of Caricatures
Later, Sunder moved to another company that published cartoons like Tom Braks and Mandrake, and worked as a cartoonist. He worked in the graphic department of Günaydın Newspaper and Çarşaf Caricature Magazine and then he started to freelance on and off between jobs. He later joined Güldürü Üretim Merkezi, which was run by the famous comedian and actor, Müjdat Gezen. He did some illustrated stories for children’s magazines for banks, mostly for promotion. Later he joined the Milliyet Newspaper team with “Yorgan,” an erotic humour magazine.
While the newspapers and other media were centred in Babıali in Sirkeci, things were nice, however, after they moved to big plaza buildings in Bağcılar, a newly developed neighbourhood close to Atatürk Airport, a slow “death” started. The friendly atmosphere of Babıali contrasted with modern buildings and offices which were like refrigerators. This was when he and Ülkü decided to leave Istanbul.
They had been married since 1982 and they had come often to visit Kaş every holiday. In May of 1997, they decided to move and sold their house in Acıbadem and moved to Kaş in January of 1998. They lived in Kaş until 2004 when they moved their new house in Gökseki.
Sunder Erdoğan Bronze Age Boat Model
Sunder also makes models of many different eras of ships from the Bronze Age to the Ottoman Navy in World War One. His model boat work is truly amazing and photos simply do not do the quality of detail nor his workmanship real justice; they have to be seen up close to be appreciated.
His boat making is an early, and life-long hobby, starting after his visit, when he was 13, to the Naval Museum in Beşiktaş where he fell in love with the boats he saw. Sunder has now become a professional model boat builder. He uses hard card boards and has many books and magazines where he can find detailed plans and pictures of all kinds of boats. Navy boats, Bosporus ferries that are seen running up and down the Bosporus strait dividing Istand and boats of fishermen, especially those from Kaş. He says that tourists go to Liman Ağzı by boat, swim in the blue waters, eat fresh fish, drink rakı and then they take the boat back to Kaş, and when they see the same boat as a model in a shop in Uzun Çarşı, they buy it.
Tim Severin The Jason Voyage
Some people who knew his boats, placed an order for several. One of these people was a collector and he asked Sunder to build a replica of a Bosporus ferry and the boat of Jason and the Argonauts. “The Argonauts were a band of heroes in Greek mythology who, in the years before the Trojan War, accompanied Jason in his quest to find the Golden Fleece. Their name comes from their ship, the Argo, which was named after its builder, Argus. ‘Argonauts’, therefore, literally means ‘Argo sailors’.”
Sunder found a drawing of the boat in the National Geographic Magazine and made a model of it. It was the boat used by Dr Tim Severin who followed the same route as Jason and the Argonauts. Starting in Greece and all the way up through the Aegean Sea, the Dardanelles, Bosporus and the Black Sea to Georgia on their journey to find the Golden Fleece.
Nusret minelayer
Another boat Sunder is building for the same collector is the Nusret, the mine laying boat from the Battle of Gallipoli (Çanakkale). This German made boat was the one which helped block the Allies in their attempt to sail up the straits to Istanbul and capture the city during World War One. The Nusret put mines near the shore where the British, French, Australian and Russian ship commanders thought there were none and because several of their ships exploded and sank, the wrecks stopped the ability of the Allied Forces naval assault to continue to sail.
Sunder is also a history lover. It is fascinating to listen to him talking about the old days in Fener-Balat. His stories about the churches, monasteries, synagogues, old schools and other things are very interesting. For example, the Ayamoglia Monastery (St. Mary of the Mongols) was built for a Byzantine princess married to a Mongol king. When her husband died, she came back home and as was customary in those days, had this church built. “It is the only Byzantine church of Constantinople that has never been converted to a mosque, always remaining open to the Greek Orthodox Church…by order of the firmans of Sultans Mehmed II and Bayazid II, which granted ownership of the church to the Greek community.”
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