Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

August 2022.

Two years after our unforgettable visit to Istanbul in the autumn of 2020, Sladja and I were in Serbia getting ready for an exciting new adventure. We were about to set off on another extended period of travel and online work. It proved to be a memorable yearlong journey that started in Georgia and culminated in Armenia via Greece.

As fate would have it, our flight from Belgrade to Batumi included a stopover in Turkey. As a result, we found ourselves with an unexpected opportunity to say hi to our old friend Istanbul. With just a day at our disposal, we kept things simple. We reacquainted ourselves with the streets of the old town and crossed Galata Bridge. We went back to the wonderful Pandeli Restaurant for dinner.

Happily, we also got to add another new sight to our Istanbul archives. And what a unique one it turned out to be. Ever the voracious reader, Sladja happened to be in the middle of a book called The Museum of Innocence by the Nobel laureate Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk.

Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

Set in Istanbul between 1975 and 2000, The Museum of Innocence tells the story of a passionate love affair between Kemal, a wealthy businessman engaged to be married, and Füsun, a working class shop girl who is a distant relative.

Critically acclaimed, the plot tackles various complicated themes, such as female identity in Turkish culture. Moreover, it is a study of how western culture has both influenced and caused problems within Turkish society.

Without giving too much of the story away, Kemal and Füsun’s relationship becomes something of a doomed romance. In the novel, Kemal both celebrates and mourns his loss by collecting precious items relating to Füsun and their time together.

Furthermore, he finds himself amassing objects that speak of Turkish culture and the social climate of the 1970s and 80s. Eventually, he decides to display these items in Füsun’s family home, which he buys and turns into a museum. Yup, The Museum of Innocence.

Amazingly, Pamuk came up with the idea of creating a real museum in tandem with his novel! Thus he began collecting real life objects and antiques that he could incorporate into his fictional story. Four years after his book came out, his museum was ready to open, which it did with a grand ceremony in April 2012.

Orhan Pamuk.

As soon as we heard about the museum, Sladja and I knew we had to go. So we put aside a few hours for a visit to the city’s Çukurcuma neighbourhood. I liked it immediately, a compact network of clean, quiet streets home to dozens of antique stores and art boutiques.

The building that houses the museum is an imposing structure, you definitely can’t miss it. Constructed in 1897, this wooden tenement building was once home to four families spread across four floors.

Pamuk purchased the building in 1999, while it took nearly thirteen years for him and his team of artists and designers to transform it into today’s museum.

There were a handful of people entering and leaving as we arrived. Overall though the vibe was peaceful as we grabbed a pair of tickets (250 Lira / $10 per person) before ducking inside the silent, dimly-lit interior.

Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

Spread across three floors (the basement serves as the museum shop), The Museum of Innocence consists of 83 art installations packed with objects. That’s one glass case or cabinet for each of the book’s 83 chapters.

The first floor covers chapters 1-51. The second spans 52-79, while the so-called penthouse presents chapters 80-83. As someone who was reading the book at the time, Sladja could immediately recognise many of the objects on display and the roles they played within Kemal and Füsun’s love story.

However, I wouldn’t say that the museum is a waste of time to someone unfamiliar with the book and its plot. In fact, I would go as far to say that it stands on its own as an absorbing exhibition of Turkish antiques and social history.

What’s more, it works as a study of what it means to be a collector. How objects from our past are living broadcasters of nostalgia, comfort, bliss, regret, anguish and so much more.

Indeed the museum has received widespread acclaim. In 2014 Pamuk and friends picked up The European Museum of the Year Award. Explaining their decision, a panel of judges expressed their admiration for a museum that is “small, local, sustainable and deeply personal”.

“The measure of a museum’s success should not be its ability to represent
a state, a nation, a company or a particular history. Rather, it
should be its capacity to reveal the humanity of individuals”. – Orhan Pamuk. 

Fittingly, Sladja and I found the majority of the installations wonderfully inventive and thought-provoking. On the ground floor, for example, we were drawn like magnets to this humongous board displaying a staggering 4,213 cigarette butts.

In the novel Kemal keeps the remains of every cigarette he sees Füsun smoke. Marvelling at the fact that “Each one of these has touched her rosy lips and entered her mouth”,  he considers them “artefacts of intimacy”.

I couldn’t help but find this act both fascinating and creepy. Even more so when I realised that Kemal took the time to number and date each stub. Sometimes adding short notes about where Füsun smoked them and what they were doing or talking about at that moment.

Some of the cabinets relate to locations in the novel, such as this Chapter 2 tribute to The Sanzelize Boutique. This is where 18 year old Füsun works when Kemal first meets her. Boutique items such as a distinctive yellow shoe and fashionable handbag appear in the cabinet.

Later in the novel, Kemal learns that the boutique has closed, sparking a flurry of emotions. “I was pained not only at the loss of my own memories, but equally by a sudden feeling that life had gone on without me”. 

Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

Chapter 15 of the novel provides a sober look at the social rules and taboos relating to sex, dating and marriage. Newspapers would often print scandalous exposés about women who’d had sexual intercourse outside of marriage.

There were also sensational stories about young working class women who had turned to prostitution. Tales of females who had been victims of rape or were guilty of being an adulteress. In such cases, photographs of the ladies in question appeared, but with a black bar running across their eyes.

Chapter 16’s cabinet is a curious one. Comprised of a single painting, it depicts the fictitious Kuyulu Bostan Street where Füsun lives with her parents. One evening Kemal goes to gaze at the second floor apartment she resides in. Hmm.

Some years later he describes the experience to a painter by the name of Ahmet Işıkçı, At Kemal’s request, the painter recreates the scene in full, including a chestnut tree, an inquisitive street dog and the yellow glow of various window lights.

Speaking of streets, how about this carefully hand-drawn map? Kemal creates it and marks all the streets he should avoid due to the fact that they remind him of Füsun and cause him heartache. Ever the stickler for detail and order, the red streets are strictly off limits. The orange roads only to be negotiated in an emergency. What a guy.

Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

One of my favourite displays speaks to Chapter 47, which covers Kemal’s grief when his father passes away. Stuffed with objects, photographs and letters, one is left wondering where exactly Pamuk obtained these incredible items.

Not giving much away, the author says that some of his museum pieces come from his own family history. Others, he fell in love with and grabbed across the many antique shops of Istanbul.

“Every man’s death begins with the death of his father. My father’s death had turned all the familiar props of my childhood into objects of immeasurable value, each one the vessel of a lost past”. – Kemal Basmaci.

Between the cabinets, on coffee tables, banisters and shelves, there are copies of the novel itself. They’re just lying around waiting for someone to pick them up and have a read.

Leafing through one copy, it was fun to read a few pages. And see the scribbled notes that people have left.

Cabinet 49 showcases a grotty bathroom sink and mirror. This is the Füsun family home bathroom, complete with all the bits and bobs used by Füsun, her parents, Aunt Nesibe and Uncle Tarik.

At last, our meanderings took us up to the top of the museum. The Penthouse is the room in which Kemal, now an older gentleman, lives in solitude. It is here that he hires none other than Orhan Pamuk (!) to tell his life story. Recounting his memories, including the full lowdown on his affair with Füsun, he charges the author with the task of writing a book about their romance.

Memories and Meanings at the Museum of Innocence.

Also in The Penthouse, a wall of glass units tells the story of how real life Orhan Pamuk wrote the book over a painstaking six years. Interestingly, some of his original notes, scribblings and random thoughts are on display.

Finally, after nearly two hours absorbing the many exhibits, it was time to bid farewell to Istanbul’s fantastic Museum of Innocence. Down the staircases we went to the museum shop, where we picked up an MOI postcard as a souvenir. Our very own object of the past, as it has quickly become. Then it was back out into the sunshine in search of coffee.

Like this? Take a look at my series of articles on Istanbul.

I’ve been living, working and traveling all over the world since 2001. So why not check out my huge library of travel reports from over 30 countries.