Retired man’s hobby turns into profession

A retired man living in İzmir, Arif Uçar, who creates wood-carved works in his 35-square-meter workshop in İzmir, sells many of his works to Europe.

Uçar, 55, who started creating wood artworks as a hobby after his retirement, received training in this field and then turned his hobby into a profession. His works are now in high demand in Europe.

"When my works attracted attention, I turned them into commercial activities. This interest even spread abroad. Especially the helmets I produced were found very interesting," he said.

It was Uçar's childhood dream to learn about wood carving and he received training from master instructor Tahsin Güler at Çiğli Public Education Center for about two years after working in the private sector for many years.

After Güler's death, Uçar's training continued with his wood master brother, Aşır Güler. After a while, Uçar started to produce small works in a 35-square-meter workshop located under Güler's house. And over time, he improved himself in this field and began to create professional works.

Stating that he has been interested in wood carving for about five years, Uçar said, "There are many areas in wood carving such as relief, sculpture and semi-sculpture. I am mainly interested in three-dimensional sculpture or semi-sculpture. Apart from that, as an Aegean, as a sea lover, I try to carve the fish of the Aegean, and also Hellenistic and Roman-era helmets because of my interest in mythology."

"Especially the helmets were found interesting. I have never seen a helmet made in wood carving. In fact, demands were not only for Hellenistic helmets, but also Viking helmets and Seljuk helmets," he said.

Speaking about the making of helmets, which attract great attention especially from...