Investigation of cover designs in Dede Korkut stories in terms of Turkish culture elements

Painting has emerged as an influential element in human communication throughout the ages, before and after writing. In the presentation of the works in the writing world, visuality has always kept its foreground. For this reason, the importance of the cover art phenomenon becomes evident in books which are derivatives of the writing area. There are numerous examples of the work named 'Dede Korkut', which is one of the building blocks of Turkish culture and literature. The aim of the study is to investigate the connection between Turkish culture and tradition in the context of mythological, iconographic, physical and many other contexts, today, based on the argument that not only text but also visual is of great importance in transferring its culture. Document analysis method was used in the study. Twenty-five different book cover designs were examined and seven different themes were created based on the data obtained. It was seen that the most used theme was the theme of war. Apart from that, the kopuz instrument and horse figures stand out in the cover design. According to the data obtained, it was concluded that the theme of the fight was the prominent theme of war in the cover designs of the stories, and that there was no common idea about the depiction of Dede Korkut.