The photo of the Month series from our archive continues with the contributions of DAI employees!
On my first working day at the DAI, I had found myself surrounded by piles of documentation on Zeyrek, one of the historical districts of Istanbul. Hundreds of photos and tens of sketches from the 1970s till today… While researching the houses, the majority of which were wooden, after some time, I realized that I had also started to scrutinize the people in the photos. Two friends conversing as they walked side by side, a woman with her bucket in hand going to the fountain in order to get water and kids whose excitement reflected in their eyes… Each detail the photograph archive presented, helped to understand the structure and life of Zeyrek and the Istanbul of that period. Places and people… There was no Zeyrek without them; same today as well, no historical district could be imagined, should not be imagined without the people inhabiting it…