FABRICATING THE WORLD SERIES 2023 (3) | WEAVING THE IMPERIAL BRAND | OTTOMAN TURKEY: On the 20th century ‘Gallipoli’ carpet with Susan Scollay

In 2017, the Australian War Memorial (AMM) bought a silk oriental rug in Sydney and paid a record price for the sale of such a textile at auction in Australia. Already dubbed the ‘Gallipoli Rug’ because it had been publicly exhibited in 1990 and 1997, its design depicted a realistically drawn map of the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey.

The carpet has an interesting provenance in that it was commissioned after the First World War as a gift to the Ottoman Minister for War, Enver Pasha (1881–1922), to commemorate the Turkish victory at Gallipoli. Enver Pasha later died fighting the Bolsheviks in Central Asia and his wife, an Ottoman princess, and his three children were expelled from the newly formed Republic of Turkey soon after.

In 1937 they were allowed to return to Turkey, but one of the children, the only son, migrated to Australia in the late 1960s. Twenty years later, the rug turned up in a Persian carpet dealer’s shop in Sydney and eventually entered the AWM collection.

DR SUSAN SCOLLAY is an independent art historian specialising in Islamic art and culture and in historic textiles. She is a contributing editor to HALI, the prestigious London-based journal of carpet, textile, and Islamic art, is a fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain, and an honorary fellow in art history and curatorship at the University of Melbourne.

Susan Scollay has lectured at The Johnston Collection since 2008 and in 2010 was guest curator of FLUID BORDERS: Ways of Seeing Oriental Rugs. FABRICATING THE WORLD | WEAVING THE IMPERIAL BRAND continues a series of lectures especially convened by Susan Scollay for TJC.

This lecture is presented on-site at TJC. Please see your ticket for details.

This lecture is supported by The Colin Holden Charitable Trust.

image caption | Ismail Enver Pasha (1881–1922), photographed by Nicolo Persheid (1864–1930), Public Domain