Do you know what dolls your grandmothers and great-grandmothers played with? Or why toys didn't used to have painted eyes?
Do you know what dolls your grandmothers and great-grandmothers played with? Or why toys didn't used to have painted eyes? Visitors to the folk and folklore doll exhibition at the House of Crafts were able to find answers to this and other questions, as well as glimpse a part of their ancestors' childhood. The exhibits were brought from Minsk by Tatyana Trushina, head of the "Paporot-kvetka" club and a member of the Belarusian Folk Craftsmen's Union.
Lepel Costume and Okono Landscapes in Focus
This craftswoman has visited the Lepel region before, presenting her personal works for public viewing. Now, she has united people passionate about Belarusian dolls, having established the "Paporot-kvetka" club just over a year ago. The name was not chosen by chance. According to legend, those who find the coveted flower can seek treasures hidden in the earth. This exhibition reveals the "treasures" of folk art to the viewers. Currently, it travels only within Belarus, but it may soon be seen by Russians.
Incidentally, wherever the exhibition is displayed, it always tells a story about our land. How? Firstly, the club's emblem features dolls in costumes made according to all the rules of the Lepel costume. This particular style appealed to Tatyana Rudolfovna when she joined the "Skarbonka" club two years ago. Secondly, the folk and folklore dolls are always accompanied by Tatyana Rudolfovna's photographs. Picturesque places of Okono are what visitors are introduced to in terms of nature. Ten years ago, Tatyana Rudolfovna bought a dacha in this area and fell in love with the Okono landscapes. She admits that journalists often ask why the rather concise Lepel costume became the club's emblem. "I don't know what to say to that," she smiles and continues, "I was so charmed by your region that there was no question about what the emblem would be."
The attire of the gentry, Belarusian folk costume, literary characters, Belarusian mythology, and a traditional rag doll – the club operates in five areas. Should one embroider tiny stitches or craft men's boots the size of a matchbox? The artisans rack their brains not only on how to bring these to life: before they start working with the material, they embark on expeditions across the republic. Gathering the necessary information from elderly women can be challenging. In such cases, Tatyana Rudol'fovna resorts to a ruse: she takes out ready-made folk dolls from her bag and shows them to the grandmothers. Seeing these, they begin to talk about their own. For instance, once a woman who claimed, "I can't recall a single toy," immediately added four exhibits to the collection. From the doll's size to the polka dots on the fabric – every detail is important to Tatyana Rudol'fovna. After crafting a doll according to the grandmothers' recommendations, she always shows them the result: they, in turn, can make corrections.
When a doll is not just a toy…
A wool ball, a family of straw crosses, a doll stuffed with sand and a potato for a head – young visitors examine the exhibits with interest. There are also several dolls here, the sketches for which were inspired by Okeno residents Zinaida Polonskaya and Evdokiya Kritskaya. There are also many ritual dolls. For example, here are "martinchiki" from Podluzhye. They were used to determine if a person entering the house was ill-intentioned: if these small dolls, hanging from the ceiling, began to move, no good was expected from the visitor. It was also believed that drawing a face on a doll could cause evil spirits to possess it, which would then transfer to a child. On the other hand, a doll without a face and ears could not reveal what was happening in the house. Straw crosses – "kresttsy" – were thrown into a well in the Mogilev region on Epiphany: whoever fished one out would be happy for the entire year. "I asked: did they catch them," Tatyana Rudol'fovna smiles. She notes that male dolls were not characteristic of Belarus. Only a resident of the Brest region recalled one of them. And while in Russia they were called "kuklak," Belarusians did not divide toys by gender.
A native of Saint Petersburg, Tatyana Rudol'fovna initially studied Russian folk dolls, then Slavic ones, and when she turned to Belarusian dolls, she realized that there was practically no material on this topic. She decided to fill this gap. Tatyana Rudol'fovna has managed to collect nearly a hundred ritual and play dolls over two years of expeditions.
The task set by the craftspeople is to create dolls that precisely match those from the last century. Therefore, they spare neither time nor health on expeditions, for example, embroidering tiny stitches under a magnifying glass and calculating them to scale. A single ceramic composition can take six months or even a year, and it is not always quick to find people willing to talk about rag dolls. However, by working on their creations, masters of folk dolls become intermediaries between generations… Incidentally, this summer, Tatiana Rudolfovna plans an expedition around the Lepel region. Thus, the residents of Lepel will also have the opportunity to contribute to history and revive what has long been forgotten.
Ekaterina OSOVSKAYA
In the photos: at the exhibition opening, Tatiana Rudolfovna shows a wool ball to young visitors; the club's emblem is the composition "Paparat-kvetka" (Lepel style).
Photos by the author.
