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Restoration of Zeyrek Camii: On the UNESCO World Heritage list since 1986
This month, the Voyvoda Street Istanbul Lectures focus on the restoration of Zeyrek Camii, which was declared UNESCO World Heritage Property in 1986. Prof. Zeynep Ahunbay joins us on Wednesday, October 11, at 6:30 p.m., with a lecture entitled, "The Restoration of Zeyrek Camii," in which she will discuss the conservation work – ongoing now for numerous years – to this mosque, one of the main vestiges left from the Middle Ages in Istanbul.
The mosque and the surrounding timber houses belong to the Zeyrek Conservation Site, and are part of the Historic Areas of Istanbul inscribed on the World Heritage List. The monument consists of the three churches of the former Pantokrator Monastery, built in 1118 by Queen Irene. The building, currently in use as a mosque, is known as the "Mollah Zeyrek Mosque" after the hodja who taught in the medrese located there, in the period of Mehmed the Conqueror.
Today, the Vakıflar (the General Directorate of Pious Foundations) has control over the monument, which sustained damages in a number of earthquakes in Ottoman times. After undergoing some restoration in the 1950s and 60s, the building was left neglected for a long time thus contributing to its degradation and partial ruin by the mid 1990s.
By the time, Prof. Robert Ousterhout from Illinois University and Metin and Zeynep Ahunbay from the Faculty of Architecture at Istanbul Technical University joined forces to save the historic structure, the dome was leaking because it had been repaired with cement-based mortar when its lead tiles were stolen and birds flew in and out of broken windows. This lecture focuses on the restoration process, starting from the moment the Vakıflar granted permission for conservation work and the plan of the monument was obtained in 1995, to the present.
Prof. Zeynep Ahunbay
Ahunbay is a faculty member of the Department of Restoration, in the Faculty of Architecture at Istanbul Technical University. After pursuing studies in architecture from 1965 to 1970 at Istanbul Technical University, Zeynep Ahunbay became a graduate assistant in the Department of Architectural History and Restoration at the same university in 1971. She completed her doctoral dissertation titled, Osmanlı Mimarlığında Sultan Ahmet Külliyesi ve Sonrası 1609-1690 [The Sultan Ahmet Mosque Complex in Ottoman Architecture and Later Years 1609-1690], under the direction of Prof. Doğan Küban, in 1975. During the 1977-78 academic year, she traveled to the UK, where she completed a graduate program in "Conservation" at York University's Institute of Advanced Architectural Studies. In November 1980, she was made associate professor with a dissertation on İstanbul Medreseleri, Koruma ve Yeniden Kullanım Açısından Bir Değerlendirme [The Conservation and Rehabilitation of Istanbul Ottoman Madrasas: An Evaluation]. In 1988, Ahunbay became full professor with her thesis entitled Mimar Sinan'ın Eğitim Yapıları [The Educational Buildings of Architect Sinan]. Ahunbay has participated in the consevation projects of a number of sites in Anatolia including Side, Göreme, Trabzon, Samsat, Tarsus and Hasankeyf. Her areas of interest focus on the preservation of Istanbul's World Heritage monuments. Together with Prof. Metin Ahunbay, she directed the conservation projects for the Land Wall of Istanbul, Haghia Sophia's southeastern façade, and Zeyrek Camii, and was president of ICOMOS Turkey from 1999 to 2005. After the war in Bosnia, from 1997 to 2001, she took part in the conservation work to Mostar Bridge with her graduate program students from the Department of Restoration at Istanbul Technical University. She has been since 2001 a member of the Bosnia-Herzegovina Commission for the Preservation of National Monuments.
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Voyvoda Street
Istanbul Lectures
"Restoration of Zeyrek Camii"
Prof. Zeynep Ahunbay
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
6:30 - 8:30 p.m.
Free admission
The Ottoman Bank Museum
Bankalar (Voyvoda) Caddesi 35/37
(0212) 334 22 70
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