Food culture in Turkish paintings, tracing the visual memory

The main idea of this study is to show that it is possible to analyse the food culture in a society with pictures that reflect the socio-economic structure by means of hierarchy, belief, ethnicity and social classes. During the study on the artworks and their periods, museums, the departments of history of art and gastronomy, were indicative. The cultural data was studied to show the different food imagery of different societies and periods. And thus starting from the artworks about food and their artists the food culture have been traced. When we look at the reflections of the Turkish food culture in our minds the novelties and difficulties of the modernization can be observed especially in the last two centuries. Our studies start from the Ottoman period and cover the republic term, therefore some of the artworks appear as miniatures and some in the western style. It has been a must to study the western culture of food sourcing from the ancient times and its reflections on art and the influence on the Turkish food culture. With the commencing of the republic period the palace cuisine was left back and the visits of the government artists to the various places in Anatolia under the name of 'nationwide tours' effect the changes in the administration. In other words, the change of monarchy to a more social and public and democratic structure could be seen on the pictures. The samples of this period showing the wedding ceremonies, the village tables, people from the ordinary public and working class appear as approvals. The changes in the history of the Turkish republic can be seen and understood by the chronology in the socio-cultural and politic transformations on the artworks with food theme. As a conclusion, it has been observed that Turkish food culture has not just appeared, isolated from the cultures surrounding it like the pictorial art. Food culture does not only mean of edible things and it reflects ritualistic moments such as people sitting around a table and socializing. And such scenes appear with different transfer patterns in every period of the pictorial art