THE DREAM OF VIOLA PLAYER - SUCCESS OR FAILURE?

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/12711763/?claim=u5t4xj8vphd">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

The portrait doll of Yuri Bashmet was ready and I showed it at the first dolls' exhibition I participated in October 2012. People liked it a lot, made pictures of it and complimented me. One of the popular newspapers "Moskovsky Komsomlets" covering the exhibition even published a photo of my doll in its on line issue. Needless to say that I was absolutely happy. 

A month later I participated in the other exhibition where my "Viola Player Bashmet Doll" took part in the competition "Dolls Master".  Again the doll attracted a lot of attention, was shot and praised. 

Bashmet Doll's photo appeared in the other media source "Rossyiskaya Gazeta".

At the last day of the exhibition I met my master, that lady who was teaching me to make a violin (see my previous posts). Do you remember that it was her advice to give my violin/viola a feminine look. Let's call this respected lady Miss N.  So I was very excited to see her.  Miss N. was one of jury of the contest and I was very eager to learn her opinion on my work.

I showed her my "Viola Player" doll and asked how she would have evaluated my first portrait doll experience. Of course I wanted some constructive criticism, but... what I heard was much beyond all my expectations...

Miss N. said that she could see no character in this doll, no image... Just a YELLOW-BROWN BLUR... 

I was totally destroyed. Apart of a "yellow-brown blur" concept I was also told some really valuable and fair comments.  The two principal of them were: WRONG HAIR and WRONG HANDS. The hair I stuck to my doll's head was of a wrong texture - too soft and dim. And the hands were made carelessly without proper working-out of details. That was absolutely true.

At that moment I was so frustrated by such severe criticism that I wasn't quite able to distinguish the fair remarks from a subjective negative view. And what is more important: having learnt the basic doll making technique I didn't get a very important skill yet - I DIDN'T LEARN TO PERCEIVE CRITICISM. 

This was a lesson to learn. How did I take it? Read my following post. 

Thank you very much for the attention to my creative torments. I wish you good luck and a nice day!