Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project © Rebecca Topakian - View of Talas, the city of my ancestors for generations, Kayseri, Anatolia © Rebecca Topakian - Ottoman identity document of my grandfather, Haig Topakian View all images ↓
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A photography project at the intersection of documentary and diary, about the Armenians of Turkey and the consequences of the genocide denial on people living in Turkey today, mixing my family history and today's experience.

In 1922, my Armenian grandfather, a teenager, immigrated to France on a Nansen passport (stateless passport), fleeing the young Republic of Turkey where new massacres threatened the survivors of the Armenian genocide. Like many others of his generation, he passed on nothing to his children and never spoke of his experiences in Turkey, Constantinople and Talas in Anatolia. The only clue to his past is a note inserted in a novel about the genocide that he gave to his children (“Un poignard dans ce jardin”, Vahé Katcha), in which he reveals how his family survived.

Considering that the disappearance of family stories is one of the expected effects of genocide, along with the destruction of memory and culture, I decided to investigate my family's history on the spot and find traces of these people who were, for me, almost mythical. At the same time, I'm trying to understand the consequences of a policy of historical rewriting, denial and discrimination on Armenians in Turkey today.

Deprived of freedom of expression, imprisoned or murdered when too vocal, Turkey's Armenians are little heard and therefore often forgotten. Their history and stories, however, represent in the extreme the experiences of minorities in Turkey today and reflect the ambiguity of a policy that hides racism under assimilationism. Above all, it's a particular feeling in everyday life: as the only genocide not recognized by its perpetrators to date, state negationism has diffuse consequences for everyday life and psychology. How does it feel to live in a country whose national hero is a criminal? When streets and schools bear the name of one of the architects of the genocide? When the president himself calls you a “remnant of the sword”...

Through the prism of my personal story and my exploration of my family history and the territory of Istanbul, the aim is to capture something of the diffuse feeling of living in an environment where your history is denied.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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A good book, hardly fictionalized, based on irrefutable documents (p.471). Your grandfather almost became one of the notables deported and murdered (p.327 ff.)if the police commissioner of Makriköy (today Bakırköy), his friend, hadn't “hosted” him in his home for a few weeks, in return for a bag of gold coins that I can still see, my mother, filling to the brim! Affectionately yours, Papa

© Rebecca Topakian - View of Talas, the city of my ancestors for generations, Kayseri, Anatolia
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View of Talas, the city of my ancestors for generations, Kayseri, Anatolia

© Rebecca Topakian - Ottoman identity document of my grandfather, Haig Topakian
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Ottoman identity document of my grandfather, Haig Topakian

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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The house of my ancestors, now inhabited by local Turks, Talas. By law, any “abandoned” house becomes the property of the state, which can then rent it out.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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A symbol of the Republic, secular and democratic, for many Turks, and therefore of the opposition to power, Atatürk was nonetheless behind numerous massacres of Armenians and Greeks, as well as heavy taxes on religious minorities, driving them into bankruptcy and desertion. Present everywhere in the public space. My family's land had, at the time, been seized by the state to build Atatürk's palace

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Tomb of my great-grandparents and other family members at the Armenian Armenian cemetery in Bakirköy, found thanks to directions from Trinity church in Pera.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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On April 25, 2022, Osman Kavala, a Turkish philanthropist known for his work in preserving the diversity and heritage of Turkey's minorities and his fight for human rights, was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. He is wrongly accused of having had a role in the attempted putsch of 2016. On April 26, a demonstration broke out in the streets of Istanbul to protest his sentence.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Artist's notes, attempts at a family tree including different branches of the family and their host countries for those who emigrated.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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The ruins of Armenian houses in the town of my great-grandparents, Talas, in the Kayseri district of Anatolia. A predominantly Armenian and Greek town in the early 20th century, the area was particularly hard hit by massacres and deportations. The few remaining Armenians were harassed into leaving the town. Today, only one Armenian remains.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Ottoman dagger from the early 20th century, from an antique dealer in Istanbul. This dagger, or others like it, may well have been used to slit the throats of Christians massacred during the reign of Sultan Abdul Hamid II or the government of the Young Tricks. In Turkey, Armenians are still contemptuously referred to as “the remnants of the sword”, i.e. the survivors, what the sword didn't kill.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Norayr Olgar, an Armenian from Istanbul, is one of the founders of Nor Zartonk, an organization set up to protect Camp Armen, an Armenian orphanage built by the orphans themselves. Seized in 1974 as part of the seizure of all property belonging to Christian foundations, Camp Armen was destined to be destroyed. Nor Zartonk protested against its destruction and succeeded, after many struggles.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Ottoman map of Bakirköy. Neighborhood where my great-grandfather lived and hid from arrest on April 15th 1915, and where my family is buried.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Now a museum of Islamic and Turkish arts, Ibrahim Pasha's palace was once a prison. It was here that Istanbul's Armenian intellectuals were taken when, arrested on April 24, 1915, they were imprisoned, tortured and finally killed. My great-grandfather would have been one of them had he not managed to hide. In the palace square, old trees used to be used to hang those condemned to death.

© Rebecca Topakian - One of the few Greek churches not to have been destroyed has been converted into a mosque, Talas.
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One of the few Greek churches not to have been destroyed has been converted into a mosque, Talas.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Dikran learned late that their father was Armenian when they happened to see his identity card, which showed his religion as “Christian”. For long, they had to hide this part of their history, under pressure from their mother, who refused to let anyone know that her husband was Christian. Dikran explores their origins and discovers the truth about history, and faces the reluctance of their mother.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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A commemorative plaque in the street where Armenian journalist, activist and pacifist Hrant Dink was murdered by a Turkish nationalist. The policemen who arrested him happily posed with the killer in photos.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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My grandfather Haig Topakian's report card from Robert College. The year 1923 is marked “Left due to political situation”.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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On Sögütlüçesme Street in Kadiköy are the buildings of the “MHP” party, an openly racist, ultra-nationalist and Ottomanist party. Their flag, several meters high, hangs in the middle of the street.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Garo Paylan is an Armenian parliamentarian in the HDP party (Kurdish democratic party) fighting for democracy, recognition of the genocide, minority rights and safeguarding of minority heritage. Facing numerous death threats, the planning of his assassination by members of the MHP was recently uncovered. The government regularly attempts to strip his party of its parliamentary immunity.

© Rebecca Topakian - Image from the Il Faut Que Les Braises De Constantinople S'envolent Jusqu'en Europe photography project
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Tag by the ultra-nationalist, racist and neo-Ottomanist MHP party on the ruins of an Armenian house in Talas, Kayseri district, Anatolia.