On the eve of April 1, Evgeny Petrosyan invited Antenna to visit and showed porcelain figurines that he has been collecting for more than a dozen years.
April 1 2018
– I’ve been collecting clowns for a long time. Gradually, I developed a decent collection of theatrical porcelain. I did not collect everything, but very selectively. The fact is that, from my point of view, in all porcelain manufactories there is a large percentage of kitsch, that is, tasteless things designed for people with different tastes. Some people don’t care if the statuette is artistically made, whether it looks charming or not. They just buy something colorful. For me, this is fundamental: the image of the character should please me and bring joy.
If we talk about clowns, then they are the personification of what a comedy artist does. It is no coincidence that I chose a clown as an emblem for one of my programs “Smehopanorama”.
This clown is of Italian descent. I bought it in Germany in the early 90s. He, I would say, is magical: if you look at him from different angles, then it seems that his look, mood, facial expression are changing. I like that he holds the book, as if trying to comprehend both life and his work, and teach us something. He is already “disabled”: he often fell off the shelf – a person will walk by and hit him on the leg with his shoulder. He was glued many times, that is, “operated”, like me.
On the far right is the same clown from “Smehopanorama”, the symbol of the program, which has been on the air for 24 years. In the middle is a clown from the Italian commedia dell’arte (the famous Italian folk theater of the XNUMXth – XNUMXth centuries with the participation of masked actors). And the third in this company trains the mouse
The concept of “clown” is capacious, has different meanings. Sometimes it sounds dismissively: “Well, you, clown!”, That is, a person does something absurd. And sometimes, on the contrary, they can say: “He was a great clown!” Or they say: “Great clowning”, when a comedy act of a clown reaches an artistic understanding of life and even a philosophical sound and so influences people that they discover something valuable for themselves or change their opinion about this or that phenomenon. Such clowning can even push a person to do a good deed, to do something good. Here are the clowns and stand in my office, at home, in the office and in other spaces and not only decorate my life, but also help to comprehend.
Of course, clownery has different colors: comedic, lyrical and even romantic, sentimental, tragic. But mysticism and other horror films are attributed to the clown as a counterpoint, as an artistic antithesis. But this is already in other genres of art and literature. For example, in Stephen King’s book “It”, the main negative character is the clown.
And this is the collector himself Evgeny Petrosyan
In their direct art, clowns bring joy to people. And my figurines are the personification of those joyful, happy moments both in life and on stage. I look at them and remember the pages of my life, because each statuette belongs to a certain period. But giving me clowns is difficult and unnecessary. I have to choose them myself, so that everyone is attractive to me.
Evgeny Petrosyan with his collection
Our Russian humor is very bright, original, one of the most outstanding in the world. There were wonderful clowns in Russia. I was lucky, I was familiar with many, I had the honor to be friends with some. For example, we met with Oleg Popov, shared our experience as colleagues in the humorous workshop. Once in the “Blue Light” they even played a little humoresque with him. Named porcelain figurines of clowns were made in Soviet times, but not many. On my shelves there are statuettes of Oleg Popov, Karandash (real name Mikhail Rumyantsev. – Approx. “Antenna”), Boris Vyatkin, Yuri Nikulin. There are also literary characters – heroes of the works of Gogol, Chekhov, heroes of folklore and others, others.