City guideIstanbul · Sat 17 – Sun 18 October
Istanbul this weekend: Filmekimi’s final days and Frank Bowling
The last weekend of Filmekimi, Frank Bowling at the Pera Museum, a free new show at Salt Galata, Istanbul Modern’s collection, Yoko Ono in Emirgan and dinner at Rüya.
The weekend at a glance
Choose a pick to find it on the map; scroll down for the full story.
Saturday · 17 October
All weekend · Saturday and Sunday
Saturday
17 October
Sat 19:00–23:00Book ahead
Restaurant · Çırağan Palace
Rüya, Anatolian dinner at Çırağan Palace
Rüya, the Anatolian restaurant known from Cannes and Dubai, opened at Çırağan Palace Kempinski within the past year. In September Travel + Leisure named it among the world’s 25 best new hotel restaurants, the only one from Türkiye.
The menu reworks classics from across Türkiye, from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea, with seasonal local produce. On Saturday dinner is served from 19:00 to 23:00, beside the palace gardens on the Bosphorus. Book ahead.
All weekend
Saturday and Sunday
Sat and Sun, 13:00, 16:00, 19:00, 21:30450 TL
Festival · Four cinemas
The Filmekimi film festival’s final weekend
Filmekimi is İKSV’s autumn festival of the year’s most talked-about films, fresh from Cannes, Venice and Toronto. This year’s 43 films include new work by Pedro Almodóvar, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Asghar Farhadi, Taika Waititi and Werner Herzog.
This is its last weekend in Istanbul, with screenings at 13:00, 16:00, 19:00 and 21:30 at Atlas 1948 on İstiklal, CineWAM Nişantaşı, Kadıköy Sineması and Paribu Art. Weekend tickets are 450 TL on Passo; buy ahead.
Sat 10:00–19:00, Sun 12:00–18:00450 TL
Exhibition · Pera Museum
Frank Bowling at the Pera Museum
Frank Bowling, born in Guyana in 1934, has painted in London and New York for more than sixty years, moving freely between abstraction and memory. Creation and Destruction is the first time his work has been shown in Istanbul.
Its curator, Alistair Hicks, hangs paintings by Francis Bacon and Victor Willing among Bowling’s, which include canvases from his Map series of 1967–71. Saturday 10:00 to 19:00, Sunday 12:00 to 18:00; tickets are 450 TL.
Sat 11:00–19:00, Sun 11:00–18:00Free
Exhibition · Karaköy
A new show about work and factories at Salt Galata
No Admittance Except on Business, opening on Saturday at Salt Galata, looks at work in Istanbul: the worker’s body, the factory floor, and how production left the city centre for industrial zones and logistics hubs after 1980.
Artists include belit sağ, on the end of the Sümerbank Bakırköy cloth factory, and Sultan Gökdemir, on the 1989 workers’ protests. Entry is free, and on Saturday at 16:00 the show’s advisers lead a tour.
Sat and Sun, 10:00–18:001,000 TL, 600 TL for residents
Exhibition · Karaköy
Beneath the Same Blue at Istanbul Modern
Beneath the Same Blue is Istanbul Modern’s tenth collection exhibition, opened in September. It traces modern and contemporary art in Türkiye from the 1940s, from early abstraction to figurative painting, beside works by international artists from the 2000s onward.
Blue is the thread: seas, horizons, distances. It fills several floors of Renzo Piano’s building on the water at Karaköy, a short walk from Salt Galata. Saturday and Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00.
Sat and Sun, 10:00–18:00450 TL
Exhibition · Emirgan
Yoko Ono at the Sakıp Sabancı Museum
Yoko Ono: Insound and Instructure is the most comprehensive show of her work ever presented in Türkiye: 67 pieces from more than seventy years, from the instruction pieces she began in New York in the late 1950s to film, performance and installation.
It spreads through the Sakıp Sabancı Museum in Emirgan and out into its garden above the Bosphorus. Saturday and Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00, last entry 17:30; tickets are 450 TL.
Saturday
Sat 19:00–23:00
Rüya, Anatolian dinner at Çırağan Palace
Rüya, the Anatolian restaurant known from Cannes and Dubai, opened at Çırağan Palace Kempinski within the past year. In September Travel + Leisure named it among the world’s 25 best new hotel restaurants, the only one from Türkiye.
The menu reworks classics from across Türkiye, from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea, with seasonal local produce. On Saturday dinner is served from 19:00 to 23:00, beside the palace gardens on the Bosphorus. Book ahead.
Rüya İstanbul All weekend
Sat and Sun, 13:00, 16:00, 19:00, 21:30
The Filmekimi film festival’s final weekend
Filmekimi is İKSV’s autumn festival of the year’s most talked-about films, fresh from Cannes, Venice and Toronto. This year’s 43 films include new work by Pedro Almodóvar, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Asghar Farhadi, Taika Waititi and Werner Herzog.
This is its last weekend in Istanbul, with screenings at 13:00, 16:00, 19:00 and 21:30 at Atlas 1948 on İstiklal, CineWAM Nişantaşı, Kadıköy Sineması and Paribu Art. Weekend tickets are 450 TL on Passo; buy ahead.
Atlas Cinemas Sat 10:00–19:00, Sun 12:00–18:00
Frank Bowling at the Pera Museum
Frank Bowling, born in Guyana in 1934, has painted in London and New York for more than sixty years, moving freely between abstraction and memory. Creation and Destruction is the first time his work has been shown in Istanbul.
Its curator, Alistair Hicks, hangs paintings by Francis Bacon and Victor Willing among Bowling’s, which include canvases from his Map series of 1967–71. Saturday 10:00 to 19:00, Sunday 12:00 to 18:00; tickets are 450 TL.
Pera Museum Sat 11:00–19:00, Sun 11:00–18:00
A new show about work and factories at Salt Galata
No Admittance Except on Business, opening on Saturday at Salt Galata, looks at work in Istanbul: the worker’s body, the factory floor, and how production left the city centre for industrial zones and logistics hubs after 1980.
Artists include belit sağ, on the end of the Sümerbank Bakırköy cloth factory, and Sultan Gökdemir, on the 1989 workers’ protests. Entry is free, and on Saturday at 16:00 the show’s advisers lead a tour.
Salt Galata Sat and Sun, 10:00–18:00
Beneath the Same Blue at Istanbul Modern
Beneath the Same Blue is Istanbul Modern’s tenth collection exhibition, opened in September. It traces modern and contemporary art in Türkiye from the 1940s, from early abstraction to figurative painting, beside works by international artists from the 2000s onward.
Blue is the thread: seas, horizons, distances. It fills several floors of Renzo Piano’s building on the water at Karaköy, a short walk from Salt Galata. Saturday and Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00.
Istanbul Museum of Modern Art Sat and Sun, 10:00–18:00
Yoko Ono at the Sakıp Sabancı Museum
Yoko Ono: Insound and Instructure is the most comprehensive show of her work ever presented in Türkiye: 67 pieces from more than seventy years, from the instruction pieces she began in New York in the late 1950s to film, performance and installation.
It spreads through the Sakıp Sabancı Museum in Emirgan and out into its garden above the Bosphorus. Saturday and Sunday, 10:00 to 18:00, last entry 17:30; tickets are 450 TL.
Sakıp Sabancı Museum