Uncanny in Architecture: Exploring Çakmak(Çatalca) Line Pillboxes

Date

2025-9-01

Author

Şahin, Abdurrahim

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The ‘architectural uncanny’ relates to a kind of fear that provides a rich theoretical base for pillboxes, considering their deployment across various geographies and their modernist monolithic form, pillboxes and the notion of the uncanny offer unique insights. Previous studies on pillboxes mainly focus on their typological formations and their place in the historical context of war. This study aims to explore their current situation in both urban and rural environments and the architectural value they possess today due to their unique formation and embedded psychological memory. Throughout this study, pillboxes are conceptualized as an ‘image’ of uncanny space. In this sense, the Çakmak Line Pillboxes provide unique cases, with over 1100 architectural monoliths and a geopolitically drawn defense line that divides Europe and Asia. Defense structures are explored not for the military power they generate, but for the diverse use of space. The uncanny is also explored not because of the fear it produces, but as an aesthetic potential through the imitation of nature. This study grounds the uncanny within the context of World War II and the complex dialogue between modernism, surrealism, and avant-gardes. It examines how these structures later created new confrontations within rural and urban environments. The intersection of the monolithic pillbox and the uncanny offers a distinct aesthetic perspective for a probable refined modernity, which can enlighten the new studies towards negatively perceived spaces.

Subject Keywords

Architectural Uncanny, Monolithic Pillbox, Defence Line, Avant-garde

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/116111

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Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Thesis