Children's Art House

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Trip to the Children’s Art House
Masha Vladimirtseva, Institute of Biological Problems of the Cryolithozone, Yakutia

I visited the Children’s Art House, in Khonoo settlement, Moma Ulus in April 2008. I flew from Yakutsk (the capital of Yakutsk where Masha lives) to Khonoo with Nadeshda Permikina, the Director of the Children’s Art House.

We toured the Children’s Art House and learned about all nine hobby groups at the center. First, we visited the "Ooyaan" room (“craft girl” in the Yakutian language), where girls from upper grade levels make art using fish skin, deer leather and fur, bird feathers, and other typical materials like dough, tissue and paper. Then we visited where students study Eveni culture (the Eveni are an indigenous population in Yakutia), wood carving, art, making airplane models, tourism, radio and clothes design. We saw many Siberian Cranes images during our tour.

In the afternoon, we had an event with children at the Children’s Art House to celebrate Bird Day, which is traditionally held on April 1st. Students from grades 1-8, about 60 people, came to the Children’s Art House to listen to information on Bird Day, on the Three White Cranes project, and Siberian Crane calls from a small film that I took at the International Crane Foundation with my camera. One seven year old boy, when he heard the crane calls, stood and said he definitely heard such sounds in nature. Students also played Siberian Crane behavior games and answered crane questions.
 
The next day we visited two kindergartens, “Kenchere” (“Young Green Grass” in the Yakutian language), and “Teremok” (“Small Beautiful House” in Russian) and played crane games with the children. We also visited a primary school and a high school, where we gave a presentation on Siberian Crane ecology, damage of the spring hunt to waterfowl, lead poisoning, and the Three White Cranes project. Two girls in this school, Nastya Arbykina and Vilena Starkova, presented their artwork to share with students in the United States.

In the evening we were invited to the inauguration of a new Head of Moma Ulus, Cheremkin Peter. This event showed mostly Eveni culture and traditions in Moma Ulus. Eveni people are a small indigenous population in northeastern Yakutia. There are many Eveni in the Ulus territory. They are concentrated in two settlements, Sasyr and Saidy, and distributed in other settlements including Khooo. During a concert dedicated to the event, dancers were dressed in traditional Eveni clothes and sang Eveni songs and played the tambourine. 

It should be said that the most interesting part for Moma students was the information about students from China and the United States. They all want to communicate with foreign students. They asked me to collect all of their artwork and to send it to Chinese and American students.

Khonoo settlement, Moma Ulus, Yakutia Students working on art projects at the Children's Art House
Young artist at the Children's Art House Masha shares a Siberian Crane video with students at the Children's Art House


Learn more about the Children’s Art House

By Nadeshda Permikina,
Director, Children's Art House, Khonoo settlement, Yakutia

Our art topics include landscapes which our children can see. Each child’s art is a composition of scientific data, real landscapes and personal feelings. Particularly, I want to talk about art made from fish skins. Sleptsova Anastassia, a school teacher, using historical data on fish skins in ancient daily life, started to create decorative mosaics from pieces of fish skin. She became the Chief of the Decorative Art Hobby Group "Uuyaan" in September 2006. School girls, 14-16 years old, create the unique art under her leadership. They use skins from northern pike, ling, chum salmon, using what remains after cooking. Also, Anastassia tried feathers in her art. Hunters know about Anastassia's art and bring to her wild ducks feathers, from which she and her students create their panels. Also, they use feathers from chickens raised by the students and other villagers.

I hope that our art is interesting to you. We have a great dream - to meet people from the International Crane Foundation, people from the real Crane Country, and to share our experience with these people. But at the present even reaching Yakutsk, which is the central city of Yakutia, is a problem due to the cost. But I think such meetings are necessary for the best future of our planet. The Siberian Crane is the Bird of Hope, and we have this hope.