Right now, many political materials in the U.S. are about as subtle as Howard Stern. There are websites, bumper stickers, signs and brochures urging us to Love W or Hate W. Support the war or bring the troops home. Each camp seems to have adopted the “you’re either with us or against us” mantra. Some of these messages come packaged in smart designs, but most seem calculated to drive home a singular position.

TRUTH & DARING
It’s why the brochure for Tol—a play from Turkey based on a novel of the same name—is so refreshing. This modest booklet manages to be overtly political without resorting to oversimplified finger pointing. It’s not a flashy piece. Instead it draws power from a simple, ingenious juxtaposition: Designer Esen Karol places images from the play next to pictures of the historical events that relate to each scene. The latter show heartbreaking moments related to the country’s three military coups in 1960, 1971 and 1980, and as Karol puts it, her piece “dares to use images that nobody dares to use.”

The visual layering of fact and fiction creates emotional heft even for those of us who can’t read the text. Since the documentary images appear in black and white, they’re easy to tell apart from the full-color theater shots. What’s not as easy to tell is how the emotional moments in the play relate to the real-life protestors, military leaders and children displayed alongside. After flipping through the brochure, however, you’re filled with a strong desire to know more about the events chronicled, their political context and how they relate to the play. And that’s the point, really: to foster critical thinking and exploration rather than a knee-jerk reaction.

EXPOSING HISTORY
Even more amazing, the brochure manages to elicit this strong response from a reader halfway around the world from its intended audience—playgoers in Turkey. It’s a feat accomplished through authenticity you can sense even before Karol explains it. “This brochure is for people who don’t know what happened before 1980,” says the designer, who’s based in Istanbul. “Everything is done to make people forget. Many students don’t know anything about these issues. They wouldn’t understand this play. They’d think it’s just a nice story.” While the facts of the country’s political upheaval are there for anyone who goes searching, Karol says they’re not often referred to in pop culture. In fact, many young people might miss the play’s political references.

Karol says many people in Turkey haven’t seen the brochure’s historical photos since the events happened—if at all. “All these images have been published before,” she says, “sometimes in national newspapers, sometimes in radical leftist magazines. So one might assume they are well-known images. However, these images have never been republished. So if you weren’t on the planet around 1980, you wouldn’t have the chance to see them unless you go into the archives. Since the population of Turkey is extremely young, and since most Turks don’t read newspapers, I can easily say millions and millions of people have never seen these images.”

STAGE DIRECTIONS
The brochure combines the photographs in provocative ways that comment on or even change their meaning. One spread, for instance, positions an image of a prop gun from the play so it’s pointing at a newspaper photograph of Kenan Evren, head of the 1980 military coup and later president of Turkey. Another shows two men with guns from the May 1, 1977, meeting on Taksim Square when more than 30 people were killed. Political gatherings have been banned at the spot ever since. Other images are controversial because they show demonstrations organized by groups declared as terrorist by leaders of the last military coup.

Since these thought-provoking photos make their own statements, they’re presented in a fairly straightforward layout. Real-life images—many scanned from newspapers and other publications —appear alongside or layered with shots of actors performing in the play. Images are interspersed with dialogue from the play reversed out of black. And on the piece’s center spread, there are comments from the original novel’s author set against bright red. It’s a striking burst of color that makes you stop and take notice.

The piece is printed on uncoated stock, bound with staples and measures roughly 5¾ x 8½ in.—a convenient size for playgoers to carry into a performance. Karol’s design makes direct links between the play—which doesn’t use real-life names or dates—and actual events the photos reference. It’s a sort of CliffsNotes for those who don’t immediately make the connections on their own.

TAKING HISTORY’S MEASURE
Before working on the brochure, Karol took the time to read the novel it’s based on. The novel fictionalizes Turkey’s three military coups, but Karol says it’s hard to be critical about the history because the country’s military is quite powerful—and seen as the protector of both the country’s borders and its political system. “Usually people prefer to remain silent about it unless there is a huge crisis, because freedom of speech is something we enjoy [only] in the last 10 years or so,” she says.

Since the book could have been interpreted in a variety of ways, she talked with the artistic codirectors of Tiyatro Oyunevi—the theater company—for their take on the novel and what they planned to highlight in the play. The pair saw the text as critical, but Karol doesn’t see her brochure as pointing a finger at any one group of people. “I can say it is critical of everyone,” she says. “Each one of us is responsible for making the history. …”

In essence, this unassuming print piece—handed to people on their way into a play—shines a light on history. It adds context to the creative work happening on the stage and hopefully sparks enough curiosity to inspire further investigation. Rather than galvanize people’s views, it makes a case for understanding the historical context of recent events in Turkey and, perhaps, seeing the present a little better in the process.

BEYOND SOUND BITES
It’s a brochure that gives you a compelling reason to look into the past. It sent this writer on a search through her local library’s catalog for books on Turkish history. Plus, she lost an entire morning reading Turkey’s section in the CIA’s World Factbook, Wikipedia entries on the country’s three military coups, the country’s official tourism website and the U.S. Department of State’s consular information sheet on Turkey. It was an enlightening few hours that offered a greater understanding of another part of the world—an especially timely history lesson, considering Turkey’s border with Iraq, pending entry into the European Union and expanding role in world affairs.

My reading expedition also made clear just how much more there is to learn. With so many marketing materials coming at us every day, it’s nice to encounter a brochure that urges us to engage the world with our minds rather than our credit cards. There’s nothing like putting down a print piece and wanting to head straight for the library.

esenkarol@tnn.net