“God be with you, I’m getting old …” – was my first thought when I crossed the threshold of a new house. Modern Art Museum on Bosphorus, A few days ago. The awareness of the passage of time came from my own relationship with Istanbul Modern, which spanned a full fifteen years of journalism.

I first visited it in 2007, just three years after it opened, as the headquarters of the City Biennale. Since then, almost every year I went to exhibitions and fairs, as it was the first place in Türkiye entirely dedicated to innovative visual creativity. At some point, it was completely closed due to the regeneration of the coastal zone of Galata. It was demolished and erected in its place with their own hands. Renzo Piano brand new shiny building. So it was logical that I should feel like a bit of an old man who used to say with nostalgia: “I remember so-and-so in his youth”, referring, of course, to my own youth.

Having risen high, you bow before the greatness of the architect, who made a symbolic “bath” so that the visitor could comfortably admire the Horned Bay.

However, the first thing that impressed me was not so much the ethereal building of the Piano, which is in absolute dialogue with the water, but that in order to approach it, that is, to enter the fenced area, which has been restored and includes a museum, a large mall with expensive clothing brands, restaurants and a cruise ship terminal, I had to go through airport security. If once these streets of Galata were for dock workers, small shops with marine equipment, kigaleries and canteens, now this place has become a popular tourist destination with high fees. Times are changing and Istanbul is selling a small – for now – piece of its soul to the western urban landscape.

liquid element

The building itself is developed in width, three stories high, and is in absolute relation to the fluid element that extends in front of it. I followed the advice they gave me to start the visit from the rooftop. Indeed, climbing to the highest point makes one bow before the greatness of the architect, I take my hat off to Piano, who made a symbolic “basin” for the visitor to comfortably admire the Horned Bay and the peninsula of Hagia Sophia from one side. and the Asian side of the city on the other. However, his most diabolical trick is that on two huge surfaces to the right and left of where the spectators stand in bella vista, he placed water. The trick makes the seagulls think it is the sea, an imaginary extension of the Bosphorus, and so they sit there by the dozen, creating an incredible mirage with sky and clouds. However, this also creates a problem. This image is so powerful that it consumes all the art in the museum. I went from room to room with the great creations of foreign and Turkish artists from 1945 to the present day. Beautiful sculptures by Tony Cragg, installations by Olafur Eliasson and Adrian Villar Rojas, Tracey Emin and so on. Nothing could touch my heart or my eyes. So as I left, I wondered if Piano had achieved his goal, or if he had masterfully turned Constantinople itself into a vast exhibition of centuries of history, erasing the futile labors of men.