PLAYING HISTORY
Two boys – Tõnu Lauk and Väinu Paas – made mountains of puppets from 1948 to 1955 and played history with them. The boys grew up and the puppets remained hidden in the loft for decades until Tõnu, now old enough to be a grandfather, found them again.
STORY OF TÕNU AND VÄINU
Tõnu (born in 1938) and Väinu (1938–1955) became friends after they had a fight in the cloakroom at school. Väinu’s mother saw that the boys, who were 9 years old at the time, made up and they soon found that they shared a common interest in history and making things. They bought some wire and cotton dolls with plaster faces from the shop, which could be tweaked into characters for all kinds of exciting adventures. The dolls were of course not enough, they also needed homes, furniture and other things, which the boys enjoyed making as much as they enjoyed playing with.
The post-war years were poor and the boys used every material they could get their hands on – the furniture was made of wood and plywood; old pieces of cloth found in grandmother’s wardrobe were used for clothes and rugs; the houses were made of butter boxes; thick paper was used for tiny books; and they even tried to use sausage casing to make boots. The boys made the things on their own, but they got together to play with them. The scale of the game world was strictly 1:10 and it was usually set up in Väinu’s home.
The boys’ skills improved as the years went by and they started to carve out puppets from wood, the furniture in the castle looked as good as the real thing, they learned to cast lead and added new pieces to the collection of documents, books and tiny paintings. Väinu kept records of their games and the things they made, so they would always remember the subjects of their games, such as Russian in Peter the Great’s times, a medieval town with a pub and a smithy, Bartholomew’s Night in France, Germany during the times of Frederick the Great, the Three Musketeers, Estonia in the times of the German Order, the raids of medieval robbers, the crusades and much more. The boys found inspiration in the movies shown in cinema and history lessons.
They stopped making things and playing when school parted them, but the things they made did not disappear and went on to bring joy to Tõnu’s children.
The exhibition will be open until the 31th of October, 2011.