Of chess it has been said that life is not long enough for it,
but that is the fault of life, not chess
Irning Chernev

ABOUT GÖKYAY FOUNDATION

 

Akın Gökyay Chess Foundation is established on January 14, 2013 by Akın Gökyay to;

Contribute to raising of strong minded youngsters with providing the popularization and adoption of the chess sport which enables analytical and multi-dimensional thinking especially amongst youngsters,

describe that chess is not only a game of intelligence but an instrument reflecting the culture and history of the countries and contribute to world peace and understanding accordingly,

to show that every chess set is a piece of art which puts the art of its country of origin forth.

to organize sport activities to make people love chess and attendant to these organization in person,

to open a chess museum to share the artistic, cultural and historical aspects of it; to sustain, develop, and provide its sustainability.

 

Major activities of the Foundation

 

To organize panels, conferences, talks to introduce chess and show efforts to raise the attention on chess,

To open exhibitions to introduce artistic, cultural and historical functions of chess sets to society, to organize every kind of introductive activities,

To establish a library where information about chess sports can be reached and with developing this library, to open it to the service of the society especially youngsters,

To give the necessary education and give trainings to teach the chess to youngsters, to organize matches and tournaments, to provide necessary places for the realization of these activities, to award successful youngsters who attend to tournaments,

To cooperate with domestic and foreign foundations, related institutions, associations, special organizations and institutions / faculties of universities according to aims of the foundation and without being contradictory to related regulations supply donations, aids and human resources from them,

Related to these services and activities and with preserving the legal limitations, to use all kinds of assets, rights and opportunities provided by the domestic and foreign foundation, associations, people and institutions together with the movable and unmovable assets it holds.

To organize activities which show that chess is not only a game that facilitates analytical thinking and improve minds of the youngsters but at the same time a game that shows the culture and art of the countries, symbolizes the historical events of the past and thus makes the youngsters be informed about the culture, history and art of other countries and to open a chess museum and give it to service of the society for these and to serve to the World peace and understanding with improving the museum. 

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A DEBT OF GRATITUDE


My father and my leader to whom I am filled with gratitude, one of the inspectors of National Education of Ministry, the deceased;

Mehmet Gökyay

Who raised me with my mother Meliha Gökyay as an honest and a beneficial person to society with loving his country; who taught me to be honest, to love his country, incredibly successful and a knowledgeable  algebra and geometry teacher, a very good chess player who taught me and made me love chess;I respectfully bow in front of the precious memory.


Akın Gökyay

AM I A CHESS SET COLLECTOR?
I DON’T KNOW.

 

My father was a very good algebra and geometry teacher and was a very successful chess player. I started to feel interest to chess with his direction. He would get me in front of him and play chess with me for hours as there was an opponent of his own value in front of him. Of course he would always defeat me. I would also be able to take a game rarely after a long time. When I stepped into the business world years later, both because of my position of being a chairman of the board of our company and my duty in an international NGO and because we love to travel with my wife, I saw many countries.

With the support and encouragement of my wife, we have found very different chess sets in different countries during these travels. It is a hard work to find, carry and to emplane all these sets. I didn’t start to collect chess sets with a thought of being a collector. The work I do is very close to design.  Although I am legist, I felt a special interest for the design work.

During one of my visits to Milano in 1975, my curiosity began with a wish to buy a chess set that is a product of a very successful design after the closing hours of the shops on a Saturday. After that I bought 3-4 different chess sets also.

I saw that the chess was not only a game of intelligence, but chess sets also reflect the culture of their origin. They carry the important events of the past to present. I then saw chess as an instrument for peace and culture and I bought around 716 chess sets from 110 countries. 412 of them made their way to Guinness Records Bokks on January 2012 as the “Biggest Chess Collection in the World.”

I continue to travel and collect chess sets with my wife. Am I a collector? Or am I somebody who likes to collect and watch beatiful things?

I don’t know.