Today in 1920s Turkey: 18 January 1923 (Old Folks and Old Photos)

(Cartoon, Akbaba or “Vulture/White-Bearded Old Man,” 18 January 1923, no. 13, page 2.)

English
(Above)
Official identifications are getting photographs
(Below)
— Ma’am this is not a picture of you!..
— I swear this is a photograph from my youth, just stick it on, will you?!..

Türkçe
(Üstte)
Nüfus tezkerelerine fotoğraf yapıştırılıyor
(Altta)
— Hanım bu senin fotoğrafın değil!..
— Aaa valla evladım benim gençlik resmim, yapıştırıver, ne olur?!..

Comments:
Today’s cartoon presents a group of citizens standing in line in a government building to renew their IDs. The text above the image reports that newly established regulations now require all official forms of identification to include a photograph affixed to them. Here, the elderly woman at the head of the line has submitted her materials to the official who is depicted examining her photograph. Although the photograph is small, it is obvious even to the third-person reader that the silhouette of the woman in the picture does not resemble the one in line.

The text below the cartoon reveals that the bureaucrat is questioning the validity of the photograph, accusing the woman of using someone else’s picture when in reality, as the old woman reveals, it is a picture from her youth. The cartoon thus underscores a flaw in the logic of using photographic evidence for identification: while photographs may be somewhat static, peoples’ personal appearances are not. Indeed, the cartoon reveals a loophole in the new regulations which is indicative of the relative novelty of the photographic medium (on a mass scale) in the 1920s. Of course, photography had been around since the 19th century but serious consideration of what a photograph represents and notions of “currentness” have yet to be sorted out at this time. Indeed, as the cartoon’s text suggests, photography is only right now (well, 96 years ago, today) becoming so widespread that every citizen is expected to have at least one shot of their mug.

Other posts from Today in 1920s Turkey explore various facets of the energized environment in which photography found itself in this decade. For instance, ubiquity of the photograph skyrocketed in the years immediately following this particular law. The popular press was especially quick to capitalize on this growing interest while holding a mirror inward toward their readers by organizing contests in which reader portraits would be published alongside questionairre responses. Such is the case with the 41-person spread from post #152. Even cartoons emerged poking fun at the various small-scale ventures cropping up around the photography industry such as street-corner photographers, which is the subject of post #130.

(Entire page, Akbaba or “Vulture/White-Bearded Old Man,” 18 January 1923, no. 13, page 2.)

For further reading, a post about the second cartoon featured on the same page of this magazine can be found here: #136. An Enthusiast of Antiquities.

This article has been updated and modified from its first iteration published right here on Steemit on 19 January 2017. For the original version see:
53. Today in 1920s Turkey: 18 January 1923 (Old Folks and Old Photos)