For half a century, there has been a debate about which of the Russian beauties served the famous sculptor Yevgeny Viktorovich Vuchetich as the prototype for the figure of the Motherland. The sculptor himself answered this question: "Wife Vera Vladimirovna, who else?" Evgeny Viktorovich was cunning.
Stalin's favorite
Friends who knew his wife closely did not find any special similarity between the monument and the original. And the sculptor had good reasons for cunning. What kind of fables were not woven around his name, they say, out of wild jealousy, he hides his spouse from human eyes, and he himself constantly cheats on her with the models. Sheer nonsense! He loved only his wife (though the third in a row).
“Well-wishers,” and there were many of them, envied Vuchetich's fame, the fact that he was Stalin's favorite, a genius who was allowed everything.
The envious ones whispered that the sculptor fought in the army of the traitor Vlasov. In fact, he volunteered for the front, fought in such a way that a year later he became a battalion commander, from the 2nd shock he was surrounded, was wounded and taken by plane to Moscow.
Swan Neck Waitress
But let us return to who of the models became the prototype of the Motherland. Half a century after the opening of the monument on the Mamayev Kurgan, those who posed for Vuchetich in the 60s of the XX century became known.
I happened to meet one of them, Valentina Izotova, in 2003 (she died four years later). In the photograph, where she is a little over 20, she is surprisingly similar to the figure of the monument. The same swan neck, cheekbones, eyes …
- I worked then, in the early 60s, as a waitress in the Volgograd restaurant, where sculptors who worked on the construction of the monument-ensemble came to dine. And then one day an acquaintance, a young sculptor Lev Maistrenko came up to me and said:
- I look at you, Valya, and more and more I catch myself thinking that you are more suitable for the figure of the Motherland-mother than a model from the Hoodfond. Will you pose for us?
I was embarrassed, the proposal was so unexpected.
- You think, and I'll talk to Vuchetich.
When we met, the sculptor looked at me and nodded his head.
- Everything, the issue with you is resolved, come tomorrow morning.
The next morning, without saying anything to my husband - he was terribly jealous, I went to the workshop where the sculptors worked.
- Take off your clothes quickly! - commanded Maistrenko.
I was terribly embarrassed, my face flushed. I, of course, have heard about models, but so that right away … At that time it was a great sin to undress in front of a stranger. In short, I flatly refused.
- Okay, - Lev reassured me, - you will pose for us in a bathing suit.
Not immediately, but I agreed. The body was covered with goose bumps with shame, not on the beach after all. For three hours, with short breaks, I had to stand barefoot, in an unusual position - my left foot forward, in my raised hand a meter ruler instead of a sword, with my mouth wide open. She told her husband about her studies, but it would have been better not to tell …
In the end, reluctantly, he agreed, but sometimes he began to go with me to the sessions. With him I was even more embarrassed. I felt especially uncomfortable at the next appearance of Vuchetich, who now and then corrected the sculptors who sculpted a small figure from me.
In the end, they forced me to bare my breasts to make everything look natural. If my husband had seen it, he would have strangled it on the spot. When it was over, they promised me a copy of the bronze sculpture. But I had to buy it at the kiosk. For Vuchetich, I was just a model. He apparently believed that the money that was paid to me for the sessions was enough.
- I wonder how much you were paid? - I interrupted the interlocutor.
- Three rubles per hour, the money was considerable in those days, so much cost dinner in a restaurant.
- You were so beautiful then, - I nod at the photo of those years, - probably the fans did not give a pass?
- Yeah, they made all sorts of proposals, only I turned them off, - the interlocutor sighed. - Khrushchev himself, when he came to our city on a visit, kept winking at me, even gave me a bouquet of roses, I love them very much. The Emperor of Ethiopia presented a gold coin with his image. And Josip Broz Tito, when he came with his wife Jovanka, handed me a gold watch.
Promotional video:
Swords to plowshares
Then, when my article was published in "Volgogradskaya Pravda", I received an angry rebuke from Valentina Ilyushina, who in the 60s was the supervisor of the construction site on the mound from the city executive committee:
- You are a good journalist, Vanya, but this time you made a mistake, contacted an impostor. I was familiar with Vuchetich from the first day of his arrival in Volgograd. We fought terribly with him because of the slightest deviation from the project, but at the same time remained friends. In a good mood, he shared with me how things were going with the sculpture of the Motherland. So, her head and face are from his wife, Vera Vladimirovna, and the figure is from sportswoman Nina Dumbadze. The legs and arms of the sculpture are all hers.
Evgeny Viktorovich told me that he came up with the idea to erect a monument on the Mamayev Kurgan back in 1949, when he was working on a monument to the Liberator Soldier in Berlin. Initially, he saw a symbol of victory in Stalingrad in the form of a pantheon, at the top of which there would have been a sculpture "Beat Swords into Plowshares", but this idea was rejected.
Then Vuchetich came up with the idea to immortalize the feat of Stalingrad in the image of the Motherland with a banner and a sheaf of ears in his hands and a kneeling soldier. But at the state commission, the sculptor was criticized, they say, until the end of the war after Stalingrad, there were still three whole years.
And then he decided to sculpt the figure of the Motherland-Mother with a banner in his hands, calling to drive the enemy to his very lair. Later, he replaced the banner with a sword, which became a common symbol of the triptych: the monument to the Liberator Soldier in Berlin, the main monument on the Mamayev Kurgan and the sculptural composition "Let's Break Swords into Plowshares" in front of the UN building.
Like Nika
When meeting with Viktor Vuchetich, the sculptor's son (he came to Volgograd for the next anniversary of the victory at Stalingrad), I expressed doubts about Valentina Ilyushina's statement that the sculptor sculpted the famous figure from only two women.
“There are a lot of fables around this,” answered Viktor Evgenievich. - The image of the Motherland is collective. Something in her father took from his wife, something from Nina Dumbadze, something from other models.
He said that he molded a figurine of the Motherland-Mother from bread crumb at one of the parties from memory, collecting in his imagination the features of several models. In my opinion, my father took the Marseillaise and Nika of Athens as a basis, giving them the features of Russian models.
I turned to the Volgograd sculptor Viktor Fetisov. As a student, he worked on the construction of a monument-ensemble, met with Vuchetich more than once.
- You know, I tend to believe the sculptor's son. Indeed, he collected in the figure of the Motherland-Mother everything that was in the subconscious, and took the composition of his sculpture when he saw the Marseillaise, her impulse calling into battle. As for the models, there were several of them. By the way, one of them lives in Volgograd, Ekaterina Gevorkyants.
Katya Gevorkyants arrived in Stalingrad in 1959 to enter the technical school of physical culture. After graduation, she became interested in rhythmic gymnastics.
- Once, two men showed up for classes. - recalls the interlocutor. - They turned to the coach, they call me. My soul has gone to my heels, isn't it from the organs? And then one of them asked me to pose for the figure of the main monument. I widened my eyes and babbled, "I can't do it." But the sculptor assured me that everything will work out. And my ordeals began. At first, I could not pose with my mouth open. Then Vuchetich asked me to endlessly pronounce the letter O. And I screamed, standing barefoot, in an open swimsuit with a rail in my hand.
- Katyusha, imagine that you are at war and you are calling soldiers into battle. - Vuchetich came to the rescue.
- In this form? - I chuckled.
“Imagine that you are wearing a commander's uniform,” he laughed with me.
And it went well. I got so bold that after his persuasion I undressed. They wrapped me in a huge transparent scarf. It turned out something like a tunic that fluttered from the included fan.
About three months later, sculptors sculpted a two-meter statue that had my figure and face. It was very similar. Then I often ran to the mound, since the institute is very close. And when I saw a figure standing in the woods, I almost burst into tears: the woman’s face did not look much like me. Therefore, she did not tell anyone that she posed for Vuchetich himself, they still will not believe. But to this day I can depict how it stood then …
Six beauties
On the trail of another beauty, Anastasia Peshkova, who posed for Vuchetich in the 60s, I attacked on the eve of the centenary of his birth.
- The sculptor came up to me when I was telling tourists about the sights of Moscow. At that time, as a student, I worked as a tour guide, she recalls.
Model Elena Sidorova, a former ballerina and the first beauty on the Neva, posed for Vuchetich in 1962. A fragile blonde girl with a chiseled figure and a magnificent bust was almost the first who caught the eye of Vuchetich.
After her, it was the turn of Vera Pokrovskaya. Vuchetich "tortured" her until he confessed his love to her and offered to marry him.
Then there was the famous disco ball, world champion Nina Dumbadze. Those who saw her at competitions claim that she is a figure like the Motherland.
So it is impossible to establish who became the prototype of the Motherland and what is her name. Her face and figure, which embodied the features of six beauties, were born in the imagination of the great sculptor and rightfully belong only to him.
Magazine: Secrets of the 20th century №19. Author: Ivan Barykin