Constructed Revolutions: Cinematic Representation of the Spaces of Politics—Ankara: Serdce Tureckii

Abstract: The intricate relationship between the cinematic representation of modernist ideologies and their spatial attributes is part of any political program and finds its concrete manifestation in Modern historiography. The new capital city of the Turkish Revolution renders a similar trajectory through which the city itself, Ankara, becomes almost an instrument of that ideological construction through the gaze of revolutionary cinema. However, what is most striking in this historical remaking is the intrusion of the third party, that of the Soviets of the 1920s. Playing a central role, the Soviets not only politically anchor into the Anatolian geography but also aid the ruling elite in their collective effort to fabricating an amnesic environment, all embedded in Modernist architecture and urbanism. Filmed and directed by Yutkevich himself, Türkiye’nin Kallbi Ankara, in this respect, revisits half a century long debate on how representation and ideology coexists in urban space.