EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Olga Pechenova, a resident of Liozno, is known by everyone in the area — from young to old. Not only as a poet, an author of short stories and essays, a freelance correspondent for a local newspaper, but also as a craftswoman. For 12 years she has been creating textile dolls, which are often displayed at exhibitions. Olga Pechenova told the correspondent of "BB" in more detail about her hobby.
The dollhouse
This is how you can call the apartment in which Olga Vsevolodovna lives, because an exhibition of dolls greets guests at the very threshold. They hang on the walls, sit on shelves, bedside tables and cupboards, and some hide in boxes, waiting to be released. There are representatives of the Eastern horoscope, characters from fairy tales, films, works of art and literature. Dolls can be viewed for hours, because each has many individual details in clothes and accessories, artfully matched to the image.
– My hobby comes from childhood. Together with my friends, we played with dolls for quite a long time, even when we were fifth graders. Most of all, I liked to dress up beauties and come up with images for them," Olga Pechenova said. – I also started making dolls, because I really like to make gifts. For a long time, I had almost no toys at home, because I gave away everything. And so, when I had to collect them from friends and relatives for the exhibition, I made it a rule to sew dolls for myself.
The interviewee admits that at first she did not like textile dolls at all, especially tildes, until she tried to create them herself. In this, the sewing skills she received from her mother and her long-standing passion for knitting were useful to her. In the 80s, Olga Vsevolodovna constantly dressed herself and her children in hand-knitted things, and even took orders from colleagues. But, it was more of a necessity than a hobby. Now the interviewee is enjoying the process of creating costumes for the characters, and this is her favorite part of the job.
– Do you see how many boxes I have? Fabrics, stuffings, threads and all kinds of accessories are stored here," Olga Pechenova showed. – There is still a lot stored in the cupboards. After all, I like to create clothes for dolls from different materials. I love the combination of knitted garments with sewn fabrics.
The craftswoman creates dolls only for herself, family and friends. He doesn't want to sell, and he doesn't know how. Only sometimes, at the request of loved ones, he can make a toy, but rarely takes on such orders, because he works according to the impulse of the soul, and not for mass production.
One toy – seven evenings
Olga Pechenova has her own method of calculating the time spent on creating dolls. She considers it evenings, because that's when she makes toys.
– On average, I spend four evenings designing, cutting, stuffing and stitching the body parts of the future doll. And to create an image: tie clothes, shoes and sew a dress or suit – from two to three evenings, – says Olga Pechenova. – Movies, books and communication with family and friends inspire the creation of dolls. The most difficult thing is to draw faces, because it is very important for me that the toys look like their characters.
Since the interlocutor is passionate about literature, there are many famous personalities in the doll collection. For example, the heroine of Alexander Blok's poem "The Stranger", Alexander Pushkin and Natalia Goncharova, Eugene Onegin and Tatiana Larina, Adam and Eve, Nastasia Filippovna from the novel "The Idiot" by Fyodor Dostoevsky. And, of course, there is Marc Chagall and Bella hovering over Liozno. By the way, the craftswoman presented the last pair to the local military historical museum. Now the dolls flaunt against the background of the famous painting by the artist "Over the city".
– The main thing is to love your job, work with your soul, then you do not spare any time or effort. And the dolls turn out to be very similar to their characters," Olga Pechenova noted.
Despite the large number of interesting toys, Olga Pechenova's favorite is the violinist doll. And also various fairies. By the way, the craftswoman gave me one of them, a coffee fairy.
The interlocutor plans to create dolls-heroes of Leo Tolstoy's work "War and Peace" – Natasha Rostova and Pierre Bezukhov. And also continue to demonstrate their dolls at exhibitions that take place in Vitebsk and Liozno.
Photo of the author.