The 10 October Monument and Memorial Place, which was built by the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality to commemorate the 2015 citizens who were murdered in front of the Ankara Train Station on October 103, 10, was opened with a ceremony. Speaking at the ceremony, Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Tunç Soyer“We consider it our duty to fulfill their dream of peace by unconditionally claiming the trust of the souls we have lost. We will continue to defend peace against war, freedom against oppression, and labor against exploitation without fear and trepidation.
Izmir Metropolitan Municipality opened the October 10 Monument and Commemoration Place, named “Life Circle”, which was built to honor the memory of 2015 citizens who were massacred in front of Ankara Train Station on October 103, 10, with a ceremony on the anniversary of the massacre. Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Mayor attended the ceremony. Tunç Soyer, İzmir Metropolitan Municipality Deputy Mayor Mustafa Özuslu, CHP Party Assembly Member Rifat Nalbantoğlu, CHP İzmir MPs Kani Beko and Mahir Polat, Konak Mayor Abdül Batur, Karşıyaka Mayor Cemil Tugay, Mayor of Bornova Mustafa İduğ, Mayor of Balçova Fatma Çalkaya, Mayor of Gaziemir Halil Arda, Mayor of Selçuk Filiz Ceritoğlu Sengel, Mayor of Dikili Adil Kırgöz, Mayor of Kemalpaşa Rıdvan Karakayalı, union representatives, non-governmental organizations and those who were murdered relatives attended.
“It is engraved in our memory as brutality”
Addressing the participants after a minute of silence, the President Tunç Soyer, commemorating the 6 citizens who were killed in the attack on the Labor, Peace and Democracy Meeting organized 103 years ago today with the call of trade unions, non-governmental organizations and professional chambers, "In front of Ankara Train Station, while tens of thousands of people from all over Turkey were shouting for peace, suicide bombing attacks wanted to drown out this voice, to silence it. For this reason, October 10 has been engraved in our memory as an attempt to drag our country into an abysmal disaster and atrocities committed against humanity. On the 10th of October of the year I took office, I promised to build an October 10 Monument in İzmir, the city of peace and brotherhood.”
“We defend peace against war, freedom against oppression”
Stating that the monument is a work of loyalty to the memory of those who lost their lives on the path of peace, Mayor Soyer said, “It is a reflection of the spirit of peace in İzmir's core in this square. We consider it our duty to fulfill their dream of peace by unconditionally claiming the trust of the lives we have lost. We will continue to defend peace against war, freedom against oppression, and labor against exploitation without fear. The October 10 Monument will be the indestructible symbol of peace in İzmir.” Stating that he once again condemned this crime against humanity, Soyer concluded his speech with the lines "If mountains, people and even death are tired, now the most beautiful poem is peace".
At the end of the ceremony, carnations were left on the monument with the photographs of those who lost their lives in the October 10 massacre.
October 10 Monument and Place of Remembrance was determined by the project competition
The October 10 Monument and Place of Remembrance project was determined by the competition. Among the 32 applications, the project named “Circle of Life”, prepared by the team consisting of landscape architect Sezgin Karaman, architect Baha Yurttaş and Faruk Makuloğlu, came first. The project, which was chosen first, focuses on the 103 people who lost their lives in the massacre with the theme of “walking into the light”.
Units of different heights, widths and forms, representing 103 citizens who were killed, form a circle oriented towards the centre. This circle represents the life cycle. The fact that the corten (transformed and living in place) material, chosen as the sculpture material, changes over time, turns red and continues to maintain its resistance, strengthens the idea of living in this area symbolically for the 103 lost citizens. The light source on the floor of the sculpture unit, each of which is shaped in a unique way, emits light at different intensities and angles according to the orientation of the form it hits, creating different reflections in each unit. Thus, 103 citizens are represented separately.
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