A framed oil painting with a difference was presented to FETAVin Fethiye by the Çalış Carnival Committee recently.

The colourful painting based on famous Turkish artist Turgut Zaim’s painting “Yorukler.” (“The Nomads”) was the community painting project chosen for this year’s Çalış Carnival.

The painting was the inspiration of English artist Tina McCallan who invited 100 carnival-goers, aged between 4 and 85, to choose a square of a blown-up postcard of the painting and then asked them to try to copy it as closely as possible to the original onto a square on the canvas to create an oil painting. The finished result was interesting to say the least!

The fun project created a temporary artistic community bringing together both tourists and local residents and helped to promote the carnival ethos “Hand in Hand for Çalış”

Presenting the painting to FETAV manager Dilek Dinçer, Carnival Chairman Peter Clark said “We are very pleased with the finished painting. It is a communal painting and FETAV office is a communal building so everyone will be able to see it”. The painting now hangs in FETAV reception.

A similar painting project from the 2008 Carnival depicting a postcard of Çalış already hangs in the Devlet state hospital in Çalış.

This years Çalış Carnival which took place on 23 May helped to raise over 24,000 TL to help disadvantaged children in the Çalış/Fethiye area.

The Committee hope to include a similar painting project at next years Carnival which will take place in Çalış on Saturday/Sunday 29/30 May 2010.