The White Palace: Disproportionate grandeur

It must have been the mid-’90s. I was visiting Washington with an Iraqi friend who was studying for his PhD. As we wandered the city we looked in awe at the urban symbols of US politics and at the monuments honouring the past. Then we found ourselves in front of the White House. “You mean this is the White House?” said my Iraqi friend, deeply disappointed. “The great US President works from this tiny building?” Then, eyes widening with enthusiasm, he added, “You should see Saddam’s Palace. It’s so big and grand.” But the US presidential building, or Beyaz Saray (White Palace) as we insist on calling it in Turkish, is not in fact a palace but a house. It is simple and low-key, far-removed from the vulgar opulence of monarchies and symbolic in its stark whiteness. Nothing more.

For some reason, every time the topic of conversation turns to the government, use of space and urban design, I recall this moment. Over the years I have seen numerous opulent palaces built by the autocratic regimes of poor countries; dynastic palaces perched upon mountains like eagles’ nests; gilded, grandiose buildings of long-fallen empires. Formidable buildings that overpower the individual, built against the will of the people for rulers disconnected from their public. Each of these, without exception, has a tale to tell. Recently, the issue of the government’s relationship with architectural constructions and the use of urban space has featured large in our lives. Urban spaces and constructions are the concrete manifestation of the government’s discourse, while ideological battles have long been fought through the struggle to protect these areas. Politics is making its mark on urban spaces, from Gezi Park to the “Palaces” of Justice, from Validebağ Grove to the redevelopment of Taksim Square.

As I watched the promo clip for the new presidential palace, nicknamed the Ak Saray, or White Palace in a blatant reference to the ruling AK Party, I couldn’t help but reflect on all of these issues. The one-and-a-half-minute propaganda film has been widely circulated on the Internet over the past few days, and both the building and the clip featured in national and even international news. The promo clip provoked great debate on social media and was shared by millions, either in anger or with pride, reflecting the country’s ideological division. It is hard to know quite how to interpret the clip’s content: its use of the İstiklal Marşı, the Turkish national anthem, rescored in the style of a military march; the bird’s-eye-view shots filmed from a helicopter at night; the fragmented visual narrative created through time-lapse footage; or the shots of the building, brightly illuminated to accentuate its grandeur.

Perhaps our interpretation should be a Freudian one, highlighting the idea that a preoccupation with size stems from a lack of self-confidence. Or perhaps we should look at it through semiotics, analysing what the camera angles and music actually represent or what kind of reality they construct. Although the content may be in bad taste, the clip certainly gives us a great deal to discuss.

At this point it may be useful to give a little background information. First of all, the Ak Saray is a very controversial building. Objections were made that the construction of the building on the Atatürk Forest Farm, a protected area, was illegal. The court ruled that the project be suspended. The Council of State said that the construction should continue. Tayyip Erdoğan, prime minister at the time, was quoted as saying, “let them pull it down if they are strong enough.” Following all this controversy, the construction of the presidential palace was swiftly completed at a cost of 350 million dollars. The building stands in a 60-acre complex and boasts 1000 rooms plus additional guest rooms, botanic gardens, an emergency room with satellite and military communications systems, an escape tunnel equipped with the latest technology, underground shelters against nuclear and chemical attacks, a huge park and a congress centre designed to prevent electronic bugging.  As you can tell, it is a vast complex. The Ak Saray is, of course, bigger than the White House, the Kremlin and Buckingham Palace. Its size even stretches the limits of the definition of “palace” in the Guinness book of records. It is much bigger than Hofburg Palace, the Austrian imperial residence for six hundred years, and the Louvre, home to the French royal family for three hundred years. Despite this the Ak Saray does not take first place in the category, since it is not, in fact, a palace, and our country is not officially governed by a sultanate.

So let’s return to that promo clip. There is no doubt that the clip is a show of strength. The choice of music is a fully conscious one, reworking the sacrosanct national anthem into the style of a Janissary march, and thus transforming its unifying character into a Neo-Ottoman anthem. It rids the İstiklal Marşı of its inclusiveness, turning it into something divisive instead. The illuminated building is shown from above, with the deformed national anthem in the background and the tune of a military march creating the atmosphere of battle. Both aesthetically and technically, the cinematography and narrative are weak and amateurish. The same images are used multiple times, and a red tanker can even be seen in the middle of the courtyard. The film does not present any of the building’s characteristics and does not situate its symbolism within a specific discourse or context. All we see is the glorification of Seljuk architecture. It is clear that the vast size of the complex and the building’s disproportionate grandeur alone are deemed sufficient (I will move swiftly on without going into any Freudian analysis on this issue). The bird’s-eye-view night-time footage, and the sparkling lights are cheap methods that have long been used to leave an impression on the viewer. In the era of YouTube, Instagram and Vimeo, platforms that are full of all kinds of videos of the highest quality, this amateur attempt at bravado must be incredibly amusing, particularly for young viewers. In short, the footage and music in the promo clip for Turkey’s new presidential palace have a great deal to tell us about the New Turkey.

English translation by KATE FERGUSON.

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