Oil painting -> List of Painters -> Abidin Dino

Early days: Abidin Dino was a popular Turkish artist who was born on March 23, 1913 in Istanbul into a family who cherished art.Under the influence of his family, he started painting  at a very young age. He started his secondary education at the American high school Robert College of Istanbul, but dropped out to dedicate himself to painting, drawing and writing.

Career:

His articles and cartoons were almost immediately available in print in newspapers and magazines.In 1933, he and five other young pioneering painters founded the “Group D”, that held several exhibitions of their work. Also, around the same point, he illustrated Nazım Hikmet’s books of poetry.

During World War II, he did drawings stirred by the conflict, but his treatment of political subjects in wartime caused official hackles.Hence in 1941 the martial law command of Istanbul exiled him and his elder brother to southeastern Anatolia.But the years of exile until 1945 turned out to be artistically  productive for Dino. While his wife Guzin Dino taught French at Adana High School, he took up a job in a local newspaper, producing articles and drawings that depicted with poetic realism of the tough lives and working environment of agricultural laborers in the region. It was at this place that he wrote his plays "Bald" and "Heirs", and started doing sculpture. In 1951, he was permitted to leave Turkey. So he went first to Rome, Italy where he stayed for nine months, but eventually settled in Paris in 1952.

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