The Tomsk Regional Art Museum has opened the exhibition “Matryoshka Motley Round Dance”. This is a must see!
Tomsk artist Tamara Khokhryakova presented a rich collection of matryoshka dolls at the exhibition. Viewers can see over a thousand wooden dolls, both collectible and of their own painting. The largest is more than 50 cm, the smallest is about a grain of rice.
Tamara Mikhailovna Khokhryakova is a history and social science teacher by profession; she is currently working with children in the Russian Souvenirs studio at secondary school No. 22 according to the author’s program. The dolls created by the artist and her students are presented in the Moscow Museum of Matryoshka Dolls, and the master herself was awarded the medal “For Contribution to the Heritage of the Peoples of Russia.”
Tamara Mikhailovna became interested in painted wooden dolls back in the 1980s. I once bought my first nesting doll on the Arbat in Moscow. And for the first time she painted a doll 17 years ago as a gift to her newborn granddaughter. Now the master draws up layouts for up to 100 places.
The very technology of working on the matryoshka is very interesting. Tamara Mikhailovna buys linden blanks for future dolls in Moscow. First, you need to inspect the “linen” – the blank matryoshka for cracks, knots, depressions … After inspection, the blank is primed and sanded until a smooth surface is obtained. Then, with a soft pencil, draw a face, sleeves, arms, an apron. In a mixture of white gouache with ocher, the “flesh” color of the matryoshka’s face is obtained.
“On a layer of wet paint, we immediately draw rosy cheeks. Then we paint the eyes, lips and hair, ”advises Tamara Mikhailovna.
When the face is ready, the background of the scarf, sundress, apron is put. And only then the matryoshka receives all the beauty – decorative painting is scattered over a sundress, an apron, a scarf. And, finally, varnishing – such a toy is not afraid of moisture, and acrylic or gouache sparkles even brighter. Of course, the author’s nesting dolls have much more sophistication and design options, and therefore this work is appreciated higher. The “family”, that is, a layout of seven places, the master, if he sits down to work very tightly, can paint in a few days. A layout of 30 nesting dolls can take about six months, since the sizes of the first dolls are larger, and the “family” itself is huge. The price for a layout of 50 places is about 100 thousand rubles, but taking into account the fact that the master needs almost a year to complete such work, this is not a lot of money.
The collection of Tamara Khokhryakova has a layout called “Wedding”. The artist herself admitted that she painted the bride and groom with her daughter and her husband, other members of this small “family” are placed in smaller nesting dolls. A whole set of nesting dolls is dedicated to Tomsk and its universities. There are dolls inlaid with birch bark, and there are modern ones decorated with rhinestones.