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Envoys
Written
by Ivanka Ivkanec, 1991
Etnographic Museum,
Zagreb
...What is a doll?
Innocent object of carefree children's game? Aid in
acquiring first life experiences? Artificial expression of man's
creative ability? Product and reflection of acquired cultural
sophistication?Souvenir? Symbol of identity? Materialized expression
through which we represent oursevles, our people? Choosing among many
explanations offered by ethnology, history, art and aesthetics,
conciously and intentionally I singled out this one: "Simultaneously, a
doll brings nations together and apart, channeling, if we may say so,
the power of their passions into cradle of common acestors and legends.
A doll takes over all this energies and finally gains a huge magical
power. A doll could express something that nobody dares to say openly:
it is a hero of secret wishes and hidden thoughts, it is a descrete
confession of oneself to others and himself." (J. Hevalier, A.
Gheerbrant: "Rjecnik simbola", p. 364, Zagreb 1983.)
I think that this
interpretation of phenomenon of a doll is best
description of King of Dolls' collection and his intention, a
framework of systematic creation of new United Nations governed
by peace undisturbed by race, language, writing, religion,
culture, or economic differences... Mr. Ljeposlav Perinic,
admirer of Croatian national costume, a patriotic propagator and
careful father, devoted himself completely to relization of basic
idea: to ask by letter the leading representatives of states and
world institutions for al doll in national costume that could
bring closer the folklore - national costume of country of
origin, confirming simultaneously the equality of all children in
the world.
The initiator of this idea was his daughter Vesna, then 10 years old
who, besides Croatian, wanted to know other peoples' costumes by owning
their dolls. Father's intention and wish to please his daughters and
enable them to know and understand other values, in course of time
overgrew its frame. Before long, the Perinic family started to receive
mail parcels. Even negative answers (for example: QUeen Elizabeth II,
Charles de Gaulle, Jacqueline Kennedy...) did not discourage efforts to
present Croatia, to use "ordinary dolls" to bring closer together
individuals and nations into harmonious rhythm moved by understanding,
tolerance, goodwill and friendship, to live side by side and not
confronted... Every doll in this collection has a seal of its fate.
Each represents a country of its origin, even when the one who asked
and the donor did not understand other correctly. Each one of them
witnesses about the creativity of its people. And each one is,
simultaneously, a clear reflection of donor's spirit, social and
political presentation of "chosen" subjects, of moral and easthetic
principles. A doll, this unusual envoy of goodwill, regularly travels
accompanied by letter...

Teresa Perinić, one of
three daughters of the King of Dolls,
obtained the doll from Mrs. Jadranka Kosor,
Prime Minister of the Republic of Croatia, in May 2010 (a doll in
Croatian national costume from Podravina, made in ~1950). It was
handed over to her by Mrs. Ivanka Ivkanec (on the left) in the
Ethnographic
Museum in Zagreb.
Vesna, Zdravka and
Dubravka spent their childhood and maiden
years in family home by playing with dolls clad in Croatian
national costumes from
Konavle
and Posavina. This small and
favourite group of dolls was enlarged in 1962 by first two
donated dolls: from Mexico by First Lady Eva Samano de Lopez
Mateos, and from Germany by Dr. Konrad Adenauer...
King and bard of dolls
proudly carries a flag and shield of
homealnd that needs love, peaceful freedom, cooperation, harmony
and unity of cultural inheritance with new achivements. Dolls and
letters received from distinguished persons from all over the
world constantly enlarge the value of Collection Perinic. It is
also our wish, from bottom of our hearts, to enable following
generations to have a permanent opprotunity of seeing the
collection, and that its ideals become a life-guiding principle
of every man!...
(translated from Croatian by
Damodar
Frlan, director of the Ethnographic Museum in Zagreb)
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Dolls
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