Visiting grandmother Ulyana. Durasov G.

Blue with a scarlet pot. Coals of cheerful eyes, ruddy cheeks, a small, slightly upturned nose. A sales beard, evenly laid with blue and red strands. Cool shoulders, epaulettes on them. The high breasts are intercepted with gids, the legs are widely placed, the pointing hand is imperiously extended. Is the brave colonel in front of me, is the general?

Only he doesn’t have boots with spurs, but the hooves, and the body, like a horse, and even radiant sun shines on his chest!

- Who is it? - I try the craftswoman.

- Polkan, ”she replies.

-And who is he, Polkan?

- Who is Polkan? She asks in bewilderment. -He lived Polkan-Bogatyr for a long time. Bread helped to grow, from enemies to protect Russian land...

- So this is the epic hero Polkan?

- He is the most, - Ulyana Ivanovna nods with firmness.

Like the famous northern storyteller Maria Dmitrievna Krivopolenova, who retained a long-forgotten epic about Bavile for descendants, Ulyana Babkin reported to this day the ancient folk image of Polkan-Bogatyr.

Today, this amazing toy is familiar to many lovers of Russian folk art. I also have a brave Ulyanin Polkan. And every time I look at him, I involuntarily remember how I first met, and then made friends with the craftswoman. Our friendship lasted many years, until the last day of her life.

And it all started in the late sixties, when I visited the young day with a young artist-nastyan on a fine May day. He crossed the threshold of his small cozy room, and the first thing that caught his eye was toys. I saw a lot of different clay figures: Tula and Vyatka, Penza and Orlov, Bryansk and Ryazan, but such are the first time. Struck in them, first of all, simplicity and vital truth. It was evident that their man had a talented and kindness of extraordinary.

So I found out about Ulyana Ivanovna Babkina. He began to ask his interlocutor about her life and about how she makes her toys.

And having arrived in Moscow, he bought sweets, colors, brushes and sent to Ulyana Ivanovna. Once I get a treasured package from the craftswoman, and in it, in a fragrant hay, like flowers, pigeons, alel, yellow, her marvelous toys were green. And among them-Polkan-Bogatyr. So our correspondence began. Of the subsequent Ulyanins, now long-awaited news, I learned that a wonderful craftswoman lives alone, she has many years-the eighth ten at the end, illiterate herself, and letters are written by her schoolgirls from a neighboring village. Not only letters came to me from the distant northern village - Ulyana Ivanovna gave me as much as she could: either her hair -kalachi, then famous Kargopol salty redders. And she invited everything to visit her: “Come, I will give you the grass to mow and wear mushrooms, and it will be good.” But I hesitated everything with a trip, and a new letter came from Ulyana Ivanovna: “The guests go by a lot, but all are not the same. Why aren't you coming to visit? "

Once, when February was in the yard, I received a letter with the following words: “All summer I waited for you, I don’t know if I wait...” I almost collected everything necessary on the road on the same day, bought a train ticket and hit the road.

The first time I visited Ulyana Ivanovna for only a few days, and all the time I did not leave me that in this, it seemed, everyday simplicity, a large, bright, original phenomenon in the modern folk art of Russia was revealed to me.

I’ll go to Ulyana Ivanovna Babkina more than once to be alone with the craftswoman. Then I will review in museums and private collections hundreds of her toys and only then I will take the manuscript of the book. And during this time there will be more than two decades...

Compiled by Gennady Petrovich Durasov.