Ali Riza

1858 - 1930

Ottoman Turkish landscape painter.

The son of an army officer, Ali Riza was born in Üsküdar, the district on the Asian shore of Istanbul. A pioneer of modern painting in Ottoman Turkey, Ali Riza was graduated from the Ottoman Empire's military academy and taught art there for many years. Like other nineteenth-century Ottoman artists, he used new brush techniques to create color effects, especially in his scenic watercolors and oils depicting Istanbul and Üsküdar.

Through his teaching and his detailed ornamental landscapes, Ali Riza was instrumental in the spread of secular concepts in painting in a culture long accustomed to nonrepresentational Islamic art forms.

Bibliography

Renda, Günsel. "Modern Trends in Turkish Painting." In The Transformation of Turkish Culture: The Atatürk Legacy, edited by Günsel Renda and C. Max Kortepeter. Princeton, NJ: Kingston Press, 1986.

— DAVID WALDNER