Feature: Turkish craftsmen improve walking stick to artwork

As winter comes in Northern Anatolia, the best season to cut branches of red dogwood trees for making traditional cane is coming.

Tansel Isik, a 51-year-old Turkish cane craftsman found his best branches covered withe snow. These tree branches will become artwork, even a national gift through his hands.

"A cane is a walking stick everywhere, but if it is a work of art, it must come from Devrek," Isik, who got the skill and shop from his father, told Xinhua.

He added that he abandoned the job opportunity in Ankara after graduating from the economy faculty at Ankara University and moved back to his hometown to run the family business working as a cane master, because he loved the family business very much.

Isik is now the most experienced cane master in Derek.

"Devrek cane is not just a tool to assist people but has art values," he said, adding that the Devrek cane is very durable because of the red dogwood trees, of which a large amount grow in forests of this northern Anatolia province.

"The fiber structure of the red dogwood is the best wood for cane. Thanks to its moderate strength and high tenacity, it can be bended, but rarely get broken," Isik added.

The dogwood will be kept for two years to dry out, and then the craftsmen process the raw dogwood into production-ready mode by hand.

"If you love a job, nothing will get in your way to achieve the goal. It takes quite a while in making cane because there are lots of steps. But after all the efforts devoted while learning how to make a cane, everything becomes easy," the master said.

In order to get the most sophisticated wood, local craftsmen cut the branches of red dogwood to make the regular carved marks, so that branches show a uniform tree knot, but a proper wood takes five years to grow.

According to Isik, one of the motifs Deverk canes used most is serpents, which means fortune and health in western culture. The handle is normally made from walnut trees, but nacre, silver, tortoise shell; even precious stones may also be used.

"I have a collection of canes, as you can see in the glass cabinet. Each one is unique. Sometimes, we draw a geometric figure or Ottoman style decoration to increase the cultural connotations," Isik said.

"Nowadays, we focus on the cane market where our clients can find more artistic value in it. Turkey's presidential palace, the Prime Minister's Office, and The Ministry of Culture and Tourism have given my cane as state-gift to many celebrities and politicians, such as U.S. President Barack Obama," Isik told Xinhua.

"In the old days, people used the canes to satisfy their real needs, but now we pay much more attention to the artistic value, because factories in Asian countries, like China and Japan, produced cheap but good-to-use walking sticks which occupied most of the daily-use cane markets," he said.

"If we don't added more art value, we have no place in the market and our craft will disappear." Isik said.

According to Recep Civelek, the director of Culture and Social Affairs of Devrek Municipality, Devrek County opened a cane art school two years ago. Apart from the art school, the local authority also arranged workshops for the communities in Devrek County and Zonguldak City.

Sevil Badur, a female master working in Isik's shop was one of students from the cane art school. Learning how to make a cane is not that difficult, but if you want to become a master, you might need to have a certain talent, and pre-professional learning and practices are essential.

"This is a job which requires inner peace and doing the job makes me more patiently towards everything. Usually men show more interest in this kind of handcraft job, but as the local government organizes workshops around the city, more and more women are joining this craft career," Badur told Xinhua. Endit