Kültür politikaları ve mekân üretimleri ilişkisi: İstanbul'daki belediye kültür merkezleri
The relationship between cultural policies and space production: Municipal cultural centers in İstanbul
Yazar: SEDANUR ALBAYRAK
Danışman: PROF. DR. İPEK AKPINAR AKSUGÜR
İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi / Lisansüstü Eğitim Enstitüsü / Mimarlık Ana Bilim Dalı / Mimari Tasarım Bilim Dalı
Derece: Yüksek Lisans, 2022
Konu: Mimarlık = Architecture
Dizin: Kültür = Culture ; Kültür merkezleri = Cultural centers ; Kültür politikası = Cultural policy ; Mekan kimliği = Space identity ; İktidar = Government

Özet:
Kültürün politikleşmesi, erişilebilir ve gelişebilir olması için ona bir yönetim mekanizması kurma ve mekân biçme ile başlar. Kurulan yönetim ve mekânlar, kültürün yaşayan ve gelişme gösteren bir pozisyon aldığı durum ile sembolleştiği ve iktidar göstergesi olarak kaldığı durum arasında ince bir çizgide yer alır. Bu çizginin hangi tarafında, ne gibi etmenlerle ve nasıl olunduğunu sorgulamak kültür politikalarına yeni bir tartışma aralığı açma potansiyeline sahiptir. Çalışmanın kavramsal çerçevesini kültür-iktidar ilişkisi, kültür politikaları ve mekân üretimleri oluşturur. 
Bireylerin sahip olduğu kültür haklarından yararlanabilmesini sağlayan ve kültürü seçkin azınlığın tekelinden çıkarıp demokratikleştiren kültür politikaları, kültür-iktidar ilişkisinin bir ürünüdür. Sosyoloji ve yönetişim alanlarında yoğun çalışmalar yürütülen kültür politikalarının, mekânsal ve kentsel tasarım perspektifinden ele alınması çokça tartışılan kültürel hareketliliğin sağlanması meselesine katkıda bulunma potansiyeline sahiptir. Kültür politikalarının mekân üretimleri, kentte kamusal alan tanımlama ve toplum için ortak değer yaratma potansiyelleri ile sosyal ve kültürel kalkınmada rol oynar. Çalışma kapsamında, tüm ilçelerde kültüre erişim ve katılımın artması için yerel kültür politikalarında mekân ve kent odaklı ne gibi stratejiler geliştirilebileceği sorusuna yanıt aranır.
İstanbul'da 2000'li yıllardan itibaren iktidarın kültürel alandaki girişimciliği ile orantılı olarak, kültür ve sanatı tüm ilçelere yaymak adına belediye kültür merkezleri sayıca artış göstermektedir. Birçok belediye kültür merkezi inşa etmeyi bir tanıtım ve rekabet aracı olarak görmekte; sosyal hizmet anlayışından gelen bir üslup ile kültür ve sanatı desteklemeye çalışmaktadır. Bu desteğin, her şeyden biraz mantığı ile nitelik yerine nicelik odaklı olması sebebiyle işlevini tam olarak gösteremediğini söylemek mümkündür. Yapıların işlevsel ve mekânsal özelliklerinde, bulunduğu bölge ve belediyenin sosyo-kültürel alt yapısının etkileri bazen bir sınıra dönüşebilmektedir. Mekân üretim sürecinin belirleyici aktörleri olan belediye başkanlarının kişisel vizyon ve ideolojileri kültür politikalarına, mekânlara ve doğal olarak kente yansır. Bu nedenle, İstanbul'daki kültür yapılarının kent üzerinde büyük etkiler yaratması hedeflenen simgesel örnekleri veya özel kurumların nitelikli mekânları dikkat çekerken, belediye kültür merkezleri ait olduğu belediyeye göre farklılık gösterse de genel anlamda niteliksel olarak geri planda kalmaktadır. 
Çalışmanın amacı, belediye kültür merkezlerini kentsel ilişkileri, mekânsal ve işlevsel kimlikleri üzerinden inceleyerek gündelik hayata katılımlarını sorgulamak ve görünür kılmaktır. Çalışmada kültüre biçilen bu kemikleşmiş mekân tipolojisinin iktidar ilişkileri, ideolojiler ve kentsel tasarım yaklaşımları çerçevesinde benzeşen ve ayrışan yönleri ele alınır. Yöntem olarak kavramsal okumaların ışığında farklı bağlamlarda, farklı mekânsal ilişkilere sahip dört örnek projenin (Beylikdüzü Atatürk K.S.M., Şişli Nazım Hikmet K.S.M., Kartal Bülent Ecevit K.M. ve Zeytinburnu K.S.M.)  incelemesi yapılır. Yapıların projelendirilme süreçleri, programları ve ait oldukları belediyelerdeki (ideolojilerdeki) farklılık seçilmelerinde belirleyici olmuştur. Seçilen örneklerin gündelik yaşama katılabilme ve canlılık yaratabilme düzeyleri; çevre ile kurduğu ilişkileri, mekânsal-işlevsel kimlikleri ve aktörlerinin söylemleri üzerinden bütüncül bir inceleme ile anlamlandırılmaya çalışılır. Yöntem ile yapılmaya çalışılan, kültür politikaları ve mekân üretimi ilişkilerini tekil yapılar üzerinden tespit etmek değil; İstanbul genelinde gözlenen durumların yapılar üzerinde nasıl incelenebileceği ve somutlaştırılabileceği üzerine bir öneri sunmaktır. 
Kültür politikaları ile mekân üretme pratikleri arasındaki ilişkileri ortaya koyan çalışma; yerel ölçekte kültür merkezlerinin var olma biçimlerini sorgularken, belediyelere ve bireylere kültürel mekân üretimine bütüncül ve eleştirel bir bakış açısı sunmaya çalışır.

Abstract:
The politicization of culture begins with establishing a management mechanism and defining a space for it to be accessible and developable. Established administration and spaces are on a fine line between the situation in which culture takes a living and developing position and the situation in which it becomes a symbol and indicator of power. Questioning which side of this line, with what factors and how it is, has the potential to open a new discussion range in cultural policies. The conceptual framework of the study consists of the relationship between culture and power, cultural policies and space production.
The concept of culture, which cannot be reduced to a single field or phenomenon with a single word, and whose meaning begins to become obscure as it increases, is redefined as it is interpreted from different perspectives. In the most general terms, it is accepted as all the values, thoughts and lifestyles that characterize a society. The concept of culture, which develops, accumulates and produces abstract meanings due to society, has started to create a field of power and struggle by embodying certain objects and situations today. Although cultural diversity and difference are evaluated with their apparent plurality and richness, they are discussed in depth through social economy and class positions from a Marxist perspective. Pierre Bourdieu and Stuart Hall, fed by this discussion and presenting different critical approaches, also try to understand culture by deciphering it through power relations. As Bourdieu (1984) explains with the concept of 'habitus', class positions also show themselves in the cultural field. In fact, since culture and cultural spaces sharpen these positions, they are also discussed with their separatism rather than cultural unifying. Hall (1981), on the other hand, argues that everything cultural is inevitably political, and puts everyday and ordinary popular culture at the center of political discussion as opposed to high culture. It aims to save the popular from the point where it is between being what the people demand and consume fondly, and being a commercial and power formation that manipulates the people.
Cultural policies, which enable individuals to benefit from their cultural rights and democratize culture by removing the monopoly of the elite minority, are a product of the culture-power relationship. Addressing cultural policies, where intensive studies are carried out in the fields of sociology and governance, from the perspective of spatial and urban design will contribute to the issue of ensuring cultural mobility, which is widely discussed. Space productions of cultural policies play a role in social and cultural development with their potential to define public space in the city and create a common value for society. Within the scope of the study, an answer is sought to the question of what kind of space and city-oriented strategies can be developed in local cultural policies in order to increase access to and participation in culture in all districts.
In Istanbul, since the 2000s, municipal cultural centers have been increasing in number in order to spread culture and art to all districts in proportion to the entrepreneurship of the government in the cultural field. However, most of the municipalities see building a cultural center as a means of promotion and competition; and tries to support culture and art with a style that comes from the understanding of social municipality. It is possible to say that this support cannot fully function due to the applications focused on quantity rather than quality are in the majority. The effects of the socio-cultural infrastructure of the region and municipality on the program and spatial characteristics of the buildings can sometimes turn into a limit. The personal visions and ideologies of the mayors, who are the determining actors of the space production processes, are reflected in the cultural policies, spaces and naturally in the city. For this reason, while the symbolic examples of the cultural structures in Istanbul that are aimed to have a great impact on the city or the qualified spaces of private institutions draw attention, the municipal cultural centers generally remain in the background in terms of quality.
The aim of the study is to examine the municipal cultural centers on a spatial, functional and urban scale, to question their participation in daily life and to make them visible. In the study, the similarities and divergences of this ossified space typology of culture, are discussed within the framework of power, ideology and urban design approaches. As a method, four sample projects (Beylikdüzü Atatürk K.S.M., Şişli Nazım Hikmet K.S.M., Kartal Bülent Ecevit K.M. and Zeytinburnu K.S.M.) with different context, program and spatial characteristics are examined in the light of conceptual readings. This examination is in the form of an evaluation of quality and potential elements at the scale of city and space. The design processes of the buildings, their programs and the differences in the municipalities (ideologies) they belong to have been decisive in their selection. The level of participation of the selected examples in daily life and their ability to create vitality; it is tried to be interpreted through a holistic analysis through the relations it establishes with the environment, its spatial-functional identities and the discourses of its actors. What is tried to be done with the method is not to determine the relations of cultural policies and space production through singular structures; it is to present a proposal on how the situation determined throughout Istanbul can be examined and embodied on the buildings.
Beylikdüzü Atatürk Culture and Art Center, designed by So? Architecture and opened in 2018, is a cultural center in one of the peripheral regions of Istanbul. The building belonging the CHP municipality, arouses curiosity with its design and spatial qualities, and is accessible to a wide variety of human profiles and integrated with its surroundings. A cultural center model that will set an example for Istanbul has been put forward by re-designing the existing structure to turn it into a better functioning mechanism. In addition, BAKSM has an important mission in order to strengthen the neighborhood life among the developing industrial zones in the district and to support the public spaces in the region. Şişli Nazım Hikmet Culture and Art Center is an example that the study can evaluate the concerns that it has about cultural center structures. It is a cultural center belonging to the CHP municipality and built with competition in the most central district of Istanbul. However, it was observed that the problems experienced in the space production process of the building, which was not built same with winning project, were reflected in the space and affected the cultural atmosphere. For this reason, the design approaches of the winning project and the spatial features of the implemented building will be discussed in a comparative way. Kartal Bülent Ecevit Cultural Center, on the other hand, is one of the cultural centers that Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality opened rapidly within the scope of the European Capital of Culture preparation process in 2007. The project, which has rhetoric about making Istanbul a city of culture and arts and creating a new center of attraction in Kartal on a high scale, has been designed in a spatially more comprehensive manner compared to most of the district municipality's cultural centers. In this context, it is an important example to discuss the space production strategies and approaches of cultural policies together with the architectural language. 
The last example of the research, Zeytinburnu Cultural Center, was chosen as an example belonging to the AKP municipality. The building, which draws attention with its design and organized programs, has created a large public space that gives people a breath of fresh air in the dense urban fabric. The project was implemented by selecting from a limited number of invited architectural works. It has been observed that the center, which is an important part of the conservative Culture Valley project, which was put forward to increase domestic and tourist visits to the Zeytinburnu district, has an inclusive attitude with both its architecture and activities.
In summary, this study questions the space given to culture by discussing culture and cultural policies with an in-depth discussion on cultural center structures. It tries to cross-read the contextual and structural analyzes of cultural center structures, which are the dominant products of cultural policies, and their discourses on cultural development goals. In this direction, it is tried to explore how architecture plays a role in cultural policies as an important subject of many sociological issues, and the reflections of architectural culture on individual and urban culture, which are influenced and reproduced by cultural center structures.
The study, which reveals the relations between cultural policies and space production practices; while questioning the existence of cultural centers on a local scale, it also tries to offer municipalities and individuals a holistic perspective on the production of cultural space and its results.