Doll

I´m trying to remember when I wanted to create her. Her (I think I need to look up her name later this article). My photographic record indicates December 24, 2024. It seems that's the day I modeled her little head. I've worked on other larger sculptures of heads and torsos, but this is the first one with which I use the personal pronoun, her. And that's interesting; it finds an echo in that essay by M. Bettini ( Doll, 20015) where he says that "a doll is a woman's body so that in some way it can 'serve' (be useful) as a playmate to its owner, that is, as a kind of alter ego, more as a subject than a mere object." That's the justification for my pronoun for her, of course. And she's the first one I think of more as a doll than as a sculpture. The doll is associated with play, but there's also something different about it, something more than any toy. Mine is articulated, so I can move it, sit it down, raise its arms, etc. And I return to the question: when did I want to create her? Since always? Like every girl, I had dolls when I was little. One was my favorite; she traveled with me to Calama when we moved from Concepción. I was about two years old, but I remember her. She had a cloth body, but a firm one; I wouldn't call her "rag" by any means. Her face was made of soft plastic or rubber, as were her little hands. She didn't have any hair because she wore a hat that was an extension of her red clothes, like a baby onesie, with a furry edge framing her face and a pompom on the tip of the hat. She was cute; I cared for her like a baby. All I know is that one day she disappeared. I never had another one like her, in fact, after those years I developed a strange relationship with dolls, rather close to rejection, even fear (especially fear of their revenge, I had a couple that I made disappear like Jack the Ripper because I mutilated them, I hung one by the neck in the wardrobe, I buried another alive after cutting her hair and scratching her face). For a few years I dedicated myself to making paper or cardboard dolls, those that I could articulate and dress with various clothes drawn by myself, it entertained me a lot.

Once, I must have been 6 years old, and I was fascinated by a tiny doll, 10 cm at most. She was dark-skinned, had little clothes, even underwear and socks! Braids of shiny hair, and a little hat. She belonged to my dad's great-uncle's collection, and I became distracted looking at her through the glass of the classic display case that people used to have (I now have my maternal grandmother's). I admired her so much that I felt my eyes widen, so to speak, "I ate her up with my eyes." How mysterious that fascination! I could absorb every detail of the doll with my hungry eyes. And my fingers longed to touch her (as my oldest son would say when he was little: "I wanted to see her with my hands") and, obviously, for her to be mine to take with me. I didn't understand why such an old gentleman would want her for himself in that display case; he should have given her to me. In fact, I asked for her; my parents called me out on it. He just laughed and said he was going to send it to me when he died. Obviously, someone else received it; it never reached me.

I didn't escape the temptation of Barbies. I really wanted one of the originals; they were expensive in those days. I still remember its name: it was the Sun Gold Malibu Barbie, with sunglasses, a swimsuit, and a beach towel. I took care of it like a holy bone. Her hair was always combed and impeccable. As an adult, I developed a general critique of the Barbie model: its banality, frivolity, the canons its form promoted (extreme thinness, perfect beauty), etc.

Investigating the mysterious world of the doll, as an artist, the questions inherent to aesthetic questioning of the object-subject arise. What is a doll? Historical origin? Doll or statuette? Primitive use/value? Doll or sculpture? Toy or art? On what does the category depend? Symbolic appreciation? There isn't much material on this very specific topic in contemporary art. But I have found quite a bit of history and authors who have reflected on toys and dolls, such as C. Baudelaire, Maurizio Bettini, and Walter Benjamin.

There are ancient figures formally similar to dolls, with great symbolic value and attributed to ritual use, such as the well-known Venus dolls. But they don't fit the designation of the doll I'm working on. Venus dolls are statuettes, small figures that extol the quality of motherhood and feminine abundance, so important for man at that time when life and survival were so fragile and difficult. Therefore, a strong woman who was a good carrier of babies was important, as was her ability to breastfeed, represented by those abundant breasts. I saw the Willendorf doll (dated between 28,000 and 25,000 BC) at the Vienna Natural History Museum in person. It's tiny, measuring 11 cm! In my art history books, it looked so imposing that I thought it was larger. But I see it more as part of magical or cult rituals.

The definition of a doll says it corresponds to "a small-scale figure of a human being used especially as a child's plaything" (Merryam Webster's Dictionary), thus, Venus dolls clearly fall outside this category, pardon the obvious. Even so, the definition fails to capture the complexity of the object; it seems not only inadequate for the 21st century—since we already have the "art doll"—but also for the 2nd century AD. I'm telling you:

"During the excavations carried out in 1889 for the construction of the Palace of Justice, the flanked sarcophagi of a young man and woman were revealed at great depth. They were identified by funerary inscriptions as Crepereius Euhodus and Crepereia Tryphaena.

The discovery caused a great stir at the time, since the young woman's sarcophagus, still intact, contained, in addition to the girl's remains, her funerary trousseau, consisting of gold and precious stone jewelry and an elegant ivory doll with joints, accompanied by small toiletries." https://centralemontemartini.org/en/percorso/crepereia-tryphaena

The doll also had a small ivory casket, "in one of its thumbs, the doll had inserted a key ring of the type used by the Romans for jewelry boxes and cosmetics boxes. [Almost disintegrated, its contents had scattered a little, the small-scale trousseau of the doll consisted of two small silver mirrors, two small bone combs,[ in addition to the aforementioned gold key-type ring, another with a setting, two tiny pierced pearls, part of some earrings, a pearl and two glass paste beads, as well as remains of golden spirals possibly belonging to a necklace, and also a hairpin and some fragments of a bath sponge. "(https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creperia_Trifena) A beautiful doll. It is presumed that the owner was approximately 18 years old and had died before her wedding, so she had not had time to give her doll to the gods. We deduce that this was an act of transition, she was leaving her childhood behind. That doll was representative of that age, or perhaps it was a tiny image of herself, and leaving it behind meant leaving a part of herself—there embodied in that doll—behind.

Another doll was found, that of the Grottarossa girl, located 30 km from Rome, in 1964. The doll was buried in the sarcophagus of an 8-year-old girl around 160 AD. It is also made of ivory and is very similar to the Crepereia Tryphaena doll, articulated. They look quite similar to mine without clothes, respecting the historical differences and the value derived from them.

Traditional Japanese dolls, made since 8000 BC, deserve a separate chapter. They cover a wide range of styles and purposes. They are not limited to simple toys but are often considered art objects and bearers of meaning. Ningyo dolls are not for play, except for some varieties. Most ningyo are display objects and have deep cultural and symbolic significance, often associated with rituals, congratulations, and the representation of Japanese history and folklore. Among the doll types, of which there are many, are: gosho, hina, karakuri, musha, ichimatsu, kimekomi and kamo, daruma, and kokeshi (I have some small ones that were part of a children's chess set; they are wooden and hand-painted, beautiful). A few years ago, some Japanese friends invited us to their home. They had a sort of platform in their dining room filled with dolls. I understood they were inherited from their families; they took great care of them, but I didn't know what type they were (I wanted to touch them all, but I realized they had almost ceremonial value, so I held back). Perhaps I'll write to Kyoko Kenai to find out more.

Something fundamental about the doll, along with its existing or non-existent symbolism, is its role in play, in that fiction that every child creates and that is more than simple entertainment. Play is a fiction we live, and our time in it is the best analogy to a play. We immerse ourselves in a role, in a different psyche if necessary, we adopt gestures, resolve situations, and we know it's nothing so serious.

Many years ago, I read a book by Humberto Maturana, our famous Chilean biologist, in which he referred to play, saying that it "does not constitute in any way a preparation for future action. When children play by imitating activities carried out by adults, they are not preparing for those future activities. In the moment of play, children (and adults too) are what the game indicates." Literally, when playing, one "lives it." Maturana also criticized the desire to seek utility or future benefit in everything. Play is lived and enjoyed, and that's enough, but we are aware that everything that this lived fiction produces in us also develops, unintentionally.

The doll can play the role of a girl, a friend, a witch, a mother, a daughter, a confidant, or a comforter. One day one role and the next another, or always just one.

In addition to play and symbolism, there is the alluring aesthetic factor of the doll. With it, we can allow ourselves to adorn it, dress it, and style its hair as we wish. It becomes the subject who has the freedom to use whatever it wants and needs. If it wants to be an angel, let it be; if it wants to wear elaborate clothes, let it wear them. There is a glimpse of the blending with the identity of the doll's owner. At this point, a certain identification takes shape, even projection. I cannot cover the uses of dolls in voodoo, in psychology, or in current family constellations. Returning to its aesthetic, a beautiful doll, full of details—modeled or sculpted—and carrying a symbolic meaning can have an artistic function. And we have talented artists dedicated to these types of creations, inevitably charged with childhood and poetic language. Baudelaire clearly perceived this, writing in a short column:

“This facility to satisfy the imagination testifies to the spirituality of childhood in its artistic conceptions. The toy is the child's first initiation into art, or rather, its first realization, and, once mature, perfected creations will no longer give the child the same enthusiasm or the same belief.” Charles Baudelaire, The Morality of the Toy, 1853. I'll copy the link; it's worth it and it's only one page long: https://losniniosdejapon.blogspot.com/2011/12/la-moral-del-juguete-por-charles.html

The first artist's doll I ever saw (in photos) was my friend Rocío C's. I couldn't believe it. They were beautiful, with huge eyes, very delicate. She made them out of porcelain, and they were also jointed. I remember she had one with little shoes made of crystals, with clothespins, one by one. The long hands were just like the ones in her paintings. Hers was the first doll transformed into a sculpture that I ever saw, transcending its original function as a toy and exploring it as a work of art, with a new purpose and meaning.

I've made mine like that too. I've delighted in its materiality, building, modeling, joining joints with wire and semiprecious stones, painting its skin, coloring its cheeks, indulging in a hair of brown and gold threads that reaches below her knees (which is my childhood wish for my own hair). Her dress is red, similar to one my mom made for me when I was 5 or 6. She has polka-dotted underwear and tulle under the dress. The same tulle on her sleeves, which I finished with gold thread. On her Calpany-style shoes, a faux ruby ​​button on the strap. The modeling paste wasn't quite right; I needed more detail there, but I was anxious to see the whole thing quickly, and that played a trick on me. But it doesn't matter. She has marks on her skin, just like I do with my withered hands. And she's sleeping. Her eyes are closed; she's dreaming, dreaming or immersed in the poetry that composes her, that constitutes her. She doesn't need to see anything outside. I created her by pampering her, and I assembled each part with joy. That's the game and the art. I thought about housing her in a miniature art gallery house I'm building. But I finally decided on a kind of nest bed. This is a section of a tree trunk; I think it's the thick or knobby part of the branch that emerges from a tree trunk. I don't remember when I found it, only that I'd already had it stored away for several, several years. I screwed it onto that fabric-covered wood—which, oh, I just realized (yes, now as I write) was from my wedding dress, for God's sake!—I placed some miniature books underneath the "nest," which are very important to her, a steaming cup of tea, some keys, and her painter's palette, related to her dreaming.

That's my doll. Her name? I'm almost finished writing, and I must say I don't know it yet. We can leave her as "The Dreamer" until her name arrives.