University submits items to folk costume expo at Federation Council

29 sets of traditional clothing and accessories of indigenous peoples of the Volga Region are displayed in Moscow.

Yelena Gushchina, Associate Professor of the Department of History of Tatarstan, Anthropology and Ethnography of the Institute of International Relations is the research supervisor of the project.

“The participants of the project are leading scientists of the Volga region engaged in the study of traditional costume, a wide ethno-cultural, scientific and museum community, designers, masters and craftsmen from Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, Mari El, Mordovia, Udmurtia, and Chuvashia. We have carried out extensive research work. I can say that the project is unique and one of a kind,” she says.

The exhibition, which will end on April 5, presents clothes and accessories of Tatars, Russians, Chuvashs, Udmurts, Mari, Mordva and Bashkirs.

“In addition, the project is accompanied by a catalog, which includes both replicas of costumes created during the project and exhibits from various museums of Tatarstan, including Kazan University, as well as private ethnographic collections,” continues the supervisor.

The catalog includes Tatar and Russian costumes from the collection of KFU’s Ethnographical Museum.

“Russian folk costumes for the exhibition were sewn by masters from Tatarstan. They used Russian costumes of the 19th – 20th centuries from the collections of Kazan University Museum as samples,” she adds.

The main goal of the project is to create a single multi-level methodological source demonstrating the features and diversity of traditional costume of the peoples of Tatarstan a century ago.

The exhibition has been visited by many federal and provincial officials.