Fikret Otyam

Who is Fikret Otyam? (1926-2015)

Fikret Oytam became known for the interviews he wrote about Anatolia and Southeastern Anatolia. He collected these interviews in many books. He depicted Anatolian people on his canvases, as well as in his interviews and photographs. He often used goats and head-covered Anatolian women as figures. He described Anatolian women as having big eyes, small noses and small mouths.

He was born in Aksaray in 1926. His father is a soldier and pharmacist Vasıf Efendi, and his mother is Naciye Hanım. He had two older brothers named Nedim and Nusret Kemal; He also had a sister named Neşecan. His father, Vasıf Efendi, one of İsmet İnönü’s comrades, worked as a pharmacist in Aksaray after retiring from the army. Otyam, who completed his primary and secondary education in Aksaray, continued his high school education intermittently in Ankara and Kayseri.

After high school, he went to Istanbul and continued his education at the State Academy of Fine Arts, Higher Secondary Painting Department, and took lessons at the workshop of the famous painter Bedri Rahmi Eyüboğlu. She graduated in 1953. He got married the same year, and his daughter Elvan was born the following year. From this marriage, he had two more daughters named İrep and Döne.

He started journalism in the Son Saat newspaper in 1950, while he was still a student at the State Academy of Fine Arts. He became the assistant of the writer and Editor-in-Chief Ali İhsan Göğüş in the Dünya newspaper published by Falih Rıfkı Atay; Then he worked at Ulus newspaper.
Otyam, who traveled to Southeastern and Eastern Anatolia for the first time in 1953, became known for the interviews he wrote about Anatolia and Southeastern Anatolia throughout his journalism life. He collected these interviews in many books. He visited Bitlis with William Saroyan in 1964. He separated from his first wife and married artist Filiz Otyam in 1977.