BoBo the Original
Crafter
Being a little lazy these days, I don’t shoot a lot and as I am totally surrounded by ordinary people, I am continuing to post some old material. The other portraits in the group forces me to find interesting people or at least interesting stories and when I “can’t accomplish the mission”, I keep on digging old images.
This one is another from my birthday trip to Mardin.
Before my trip I Googled the net to see what should I see there and learned that there is a copper bazaar where you can see crafters working. The first thing that came to my mind was an image with some craftsman is working on copper or iron, a furnace of some kind, fire, dark atmosphere etc… I guess you had the idea.
When I went to Mardin and found the bazaar, I experienced a big disappointment. First of all it was Ramadan and as it was Sunday most of the shops were shut. Actually, there were only two open. More than that, I learned later that as economical conditions got worse, several crafters had quit working with copper and a significant amount shops were closed. In short, the old bazaar was not there anymore.
I strolled around for some time and when it became that I won’t be able to shoot what I had in mind, I decided to be contented with what I have and entered one of the shops with a big “Selamün Aleyküm”. That is:
As-salamu alaykum (English: al-salâmu ’alaykum, Arabic السلام عليكم) is an Arabic greeting often used by Muslimsaround the world and is widely used in the Muslim world even by non-Muslims. It nearly translates to "peace be upon you", but is often considered the equivalent to "hello", "hi" or "good day" in English. The standard response to the greeting is Wa alaykumu s-salam.
Greeted nicely by Master Ahmet, I sat down next to him and started watching him pursue his art. It’s a tough job and it takes a lot of time to finish every piece. Most of the items were fully hand made and requies a big amount of patience.
We talked about the bazaar and he complained that most of the masters of the profession decided not to work anymore and the art is “dying”. I asked him whether it is not possible to sell the goods to big cities where more people willing to pay more might be found and he told me they do have some sales of that sort from time to time but it is not easy to survive.
As the profits drop and several people decided to quit, interest from the new generation had decreased substantially and the number of masters and apprentices are decreasing rapidly. He told me his father and grandfather was working with copper but his son will not and this is something sad to hear.
You can find several images here if you want to see these people's art and here's a video (I'm afraid in Turkish to see how they work.
This picture is #14 in my 100 strangers project. Find out more about the project and see pictures taken by other photographers at the 100 Strangers Flickr Group page
Crafter
Being a little lazy these days, I don’t shoot a lot and as I am totally surrounded by ordinary people, I am continuing to post some old material. The other portraits in the group forces me to find interesting people or at least interesting stories and when I “can’t accomplish the mission”, I keep on digging old images.
This one is another from my birthday trip to Mardin.
Before my trip I Googled the net to see what should I see there and learned that there is a copper bazaar where you can see crafters working. The first thing that came to my mind was an image with some craftsman is working on copper or iron, a furnace of some kind, fire, dark atmosphere etc… I guess you had the idea.
When I went to Mardin and found the bazaar, I experienced a big disappointment. First of all it was Ramadan and as it was Sunday most of the shops were shut. Actually, there were only two open. More than that, I learned later that as economical conditions got worse, several crafters had quit working with copper and a significant amount shops were closed. In short, the old bazaar was not there anymore.
I strolled around for some time and when it became that I won’t be able to shoot what I had in mind, I decided to be contented with what I have and entered one of the shops with a big “Selamün Aleyküm”. That is:
As-salamu alaykum (English: al-salâmu ’alaykum, Arabic السلام عليكم) is an Arabic greeting often used by Muslimsaround the world and is widely used in the Muslim world even by non-Muslims. It nearly translates to "peace be upon you", but is often considered the equivalent to "hello", "hi" or "good day" in English. The standard response to the greeting is Wa alaykumu s-salam.
Greeted nicely by Master Ahmet, I sat down next to him and started watching him pursue his art. It’s a tough job and it takes a lot of time to finish every piece. Most of the items were fully hand made and requies a big amount of patience.
We talked about the bazaar and he complained that most of the masters of the profession decided not to work anymore and the art is “dying”. I asked him whether it is not possible to sell the goods to big cities where more people willing to pay more might be found and he told me they do have some sales of that sort from time to time but it is not easy to survive.
As the profits drop and several people decided to quit, interest from the new generation had decreased substantially and the number of masters and apprentices are decreasing rapidly. He told me his father and grandfather was working with copper but his son will not and this is something sad to hear.
You can find several images here if you want to see these people's art and here's a video (I'm afraid in Turkish to see how they work.
This picture is #14 in my 100 strangers project. Find out more about the project and see pictures taken by other photographers at the 100 Strangers Flickr Group page