Puppetry Day: secrets of an unusual profession

Childhood is impossible to imagine without dolls. Plump-cheeked baby dolls, fashionable Barbies, brave Indians and soldiers, literary and cartoon characters, who come to life on the pages of books or gadget screens, are always with the child. They'll support and teach kids and become their best friends. But more and more often dolls get into the adult world, where they're no longer playmates, but objects of aesthetic pleasure, elements of interior design, collectibles, and, sometimes, a career.

The West experienced a "puppet" boom around the middle of the last century. Then in Europe and the United States, the first specialized schools, exhibitions, and auctions appeared. It turned out that collecting author's dolls could be no less prestigious than collecting paintings, diamonds, or antiques. Among the famous collectors of modern dolls are Demi Moore, Bruce Willis, Whoopi Goldberg, Robbie Williams, Barbara Streisand, Oprah Winfrey, the wife of former US President Barbara Bush. Princess Diana also collected dolls.

Our puppeteers, who had nothing to do with the theater, perceived their work exclusively as an interesting hobby, until recently not even suspecting that creating puppets is an actual profession.