Our knowledge on human history begins with painting. In the ages when history could not be recorded by writing, the pictures drawn on cave walls have the feature of being the first expressions of human beings’ feelings and thoughts rather than having artistic concerns. These shapes which form the core of the alphabet as we know it today, prove us that primitive human also had visual perception and visual communication abilities and that writing and painting have been in a continuation-change relationship from the earliest ages to the present day, although this situation has been reversed in some periods. The relationship between visual arts and writings, image and words or painting and poetry has been the subject of both philosophy and art, from ancient Greek philosophers to contemporary art critics and it has been studied under may different perspectives. This relationship is sometimes evaluated with as equal which we can understand from the words of the Ancient Greek poet Simonides who says that “Poetry is the painting that speaks and the painting is the silent poem” or the Roman poet Horatius’s words “Poetry is like a painting”. But it may also result to an idea of superiority of either, like L. da Vinci arguing “Is it the name of man or the image?” and preferring the image over the duality. Although poetry and painting, which have been transferred from caves walls to clay tablets, from clay tablets to canvas and from canvas to paper throughout history, have continued their development from time to time separately, their effects and reflections on each other have always continued. The interaction of these two branches of art which keep going influence each other today, provides the emergence of very different products containing intense emotions and impressions. Our work is based on the Scientific Research Project (BAP) with IP number 21951 supported by Ege University and completed in June 2022, called Reflections from Poetry to Printmaking which brings Turkish poetry and Turkish painting together. Within the scope of the project, 40 different artists transferred to printmaking 40 carefully selected Turkish poetry from the Republic period, based on their personal impressions. In this study, a few pictures in question will be examined with the ekphrasis method in order to give information about the overall project. Ekphrasis is an intertextual method that allows the verbal/written representation of visual art works. The aim is to discover the meeting points created by painting and writing, which have been different ways of self-expression of human since the early ages, and to contribute to the relations established between visual art works and literary texts.
Keywords: Poetry, printmaking, art, ekphrasis