My Faithful Beloved is Black Earth: Interpretation of Aşik Veysel's folk songs with ceramic art

Since the early ages, human beings have tried to express the events and emotions they have experienced by using different means of communication. The first of these has been the sounds they make. They have produced epics, tales, poems, and folk songs using words to self-expres. These works have been passed down from generation to generation and have become the carrier of cultural heritage. In Anatolia, people wrote poems and then transformed them into folk songs accompanied by instrumental instruments, taking it upon themselves to reveal the unheard and unknown. Anatolia has raised many names, such as Pir Sultan Abdal, Yunus Emre, and Dadaloğlu, as well as Âşık Veysel, who followed in their footsteps by blending them with its culture. The impressiveness of the verses spoken by the blind Âşık Veysel, who saw with his heart's eye, fascinated the listeners like a mirror held up to Anatolia. Âşık Veysel is one of the strong representatives of the tradition of minstrelsy, which has made it popular all over Türkiye. The tradition of minstrelsy was inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009. In 2022, it was decided by the Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye to award the Grand Prize of Culture and Arts to Âşık Veysel in the "Loyalty" category. Finally, with the decision of the 41st General Conference of UNESCO, the 50th Anniversary of the Death of Âşık Veysel was included in the UNESCO Commemoration and Celebration Anniversaries Program for 2023 with the support of Azerbaijan, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, North Macedonia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, with the circular numbered 2022/19 published in the Official Gazette dated 29/12/2022 and numbered 32058, it was decided to celebrate the year 2023 as the year of Âşık Veysel and to plan activities throughout the year. In 2023, the 50th anniversary of his death was commemorated, and events were organized under the auspices of the Presidency in Türkiye and worldwide in conjunction with UNESCO. Many books have been written about Âşık Veysel. His life and art have been the subject of documentaries, films, theaters, and operas, and he has been depicted playing the saz and sculpted in artworks. However, very few artworks have been found on Âşık Veysel's folk songs. This study aims to interpret Âşık Veysel folk songs through ceramic artifacts. The study is considered necessary in terms of revealing Âşık Veysel Şatıroğlu's philosophy and folk songs in a concrete way through ceramic artifacts. The document analysis method, one of the qualitative research designs, was used in the study. Eight of Âşık Veysel's most well-known folk songs were selected through a literature review. It was seen that the prominent metaphors in the selected folk songs were nature, equality, human relations, and love. These metaphors were interpreted with ceramic art, creating twelve ceramic artifacts. As a result, it is possible to observe and experience the connotations of Veysel folk songs in the resulting works. The traces left by Âşık Veysel's voice and words in our image world will gain dimension and color through ceramic art, enabling us to look at his folk songs from a different perspective.