Neo-Topac, 2020

touch object

Neo-Topaç is a repurposed spinning top, a modern touch object in the form of a tumbler, that carries the memories and identity of Istanbul's craft culture. It is the result of a creative collaboration with traditional wood master Hasan Usta and metal master Nedim Usta.

Nedim Usta is the last generation working at his family craft business and Hasan Usta is the last traditional spinning top maker in Istanbul. They are both still carrying a childish soul at their studios and trying to keep their production alive against global industrial production, gentrification and urban transformation.

“Craft polarizes and collapses theoretical positions about what making means today.
Craft is contemporary because it is the pivot between art and commerce,
between work and leisure, between past and future.
There is no such thing as ‘the contemporary’, and there is no such thing as craft.
With all its complexities, with all its different registers of meaning across history, across class, across gender, across institutions, craft is all of these things, some of these things, none of these things.”

Julia Bryan-Wilson

#Crafted In Istanbul

Produced in Craft studios of Istanbul:

Wooden Lathe: Hasan An, Metal Lathe: Nedim Köroğlu