Baba Yaga: Action Ficture Edition
November 16, 2024 6:03 AM Subscribe
An enterprising MFA student at East Tennessee State University created a Baba Yaga "collectible figurine" as a thesis project. Ariel Adams' project involved designing the character, building it, and painting it, using a variety of analogue and digital tools. Her style and interpretation of the figure are interesting, not a 1:1 with the conventional depictions we most often see of Baba Yaga, and her thesis is absolutely worth a read, if you are interested in Baba Yaga, action figures, and/or character design.
I regularly run across serviceable theses or dissertations on Google Scholar, and I tend not to post them here. They're not always well written, and often the ideas in them are clearly embryonic, and it seems a kindness to give the student time to develop the work further. In this case, however, I was delighted by the thesis, and I thought it was fascinating on multiple counts.
Note: I do know the author of the linked Atlas Obscura piece a little bit, and I moderated a panel she was on recently at a writers conference. She's done a couple of Baba Yaga books recently, and they seem to have been well received.
I regularly run across serviceable theses or dissertations on Google Scholar, and I tend not to post them here. They're not always well written, and often the ideas in them are clearly embryonic, and it seems a kindness to give the student time to develop the work further. In this case, however, I was delighted by the thesis, and I thought it was fascinating on multiple counts.
Note: I do know the author of the linked Atlas Obscura piece a little bit, and I moderated a panel she was on recently at a writers conference. She's done a couple of Baba Yaga books recently, and they seem to have been well received.
I mean, my woman-in-her-late-40s goal is to live that Baba Yaga lifestyle but I have to confess the house part is proving tricky
posted by Kitteh at 6:14 AM on November 16 [14 favorites]
posted by Kitteh at 6:14 AM on November 16 [14 favorites]
I know! It's definitely non-traditional, but it did make me stop and think about what my core image is for Baba Yaga. Is it the house and the chicken legs? Is it the pestle flying through the sky? I'm not sure, but when I saw the figurine, I felt a little chime of recognition, even as I was trying to reconcile what I was looking at with my expectations. That internal response is, for me, one of the signifiers of true art. Wildly subjective, of course, but there it is.
posted by cupcakeninja at 6:24 AM on November 16 [2 favorites]
posted by cupcakeninja at 6:24 AM on November 16 [2 favorites]
Another Baba Yaga fan here, but did not know that she may have originally been a Slavic goddess and Earth Mother.
posted by kozad at 6:30 AM on November 16 [2 favorites]
posted by kozad at 6:30 AM on November 16 [2 favorites]
The thesis is so much fun too. Like, it's got the voice of youth (I've been reading high school and college papers lately, and they share a kind of...formal informality, a natural conversational style wedged into a sort of stilted properness, like squeezing into sunday shoes for church), but she's so thoughtful about her aesthetic and technical choices (although wooo, content warning for surgery pics where she's designing the character's base, that was unexpected!)...the character's dirtiness because she's working with the machinery of her pestle, is just, like, yes, that makes perfect sense as a maybe steampunkish development from the original stories. I hope she goes on to do fun things!
posted by mittens at 6:36 AM on November 16 [3 favorites]
posted by mittens at 6:36 AM on November 16 [3 favorites]
As someone who has never seen the movies, what does John Wick have to do with Baba Yaga?
posted by Jon_Evil at 7:19 AM on November 16 [1 favorite]
posted by Jon_Evil at 7:19 AM on November 16 [1 favorite]
It’s the Russian mob’s nickname for John, since he’s so terrifying. I feel like the screenwriters may have not in fact known that she was an elderly witch.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 7:27 AM on November 16 [12 favorites]
posted by Jon Mitchell at 7:27 AM on November 16 [12 favorites]
He's portrayed as a clever, virtually unstoppable super-duper assassin guy, especially in the first film in the series. Sometimes referred to as "Baba Yaga" or "the Baba Yaga," because once he has you in his sights, you're going down. Partly due to Russian gangsters/underworld stuff, but it is interesting that she's the go-to big bad to describe Wick.
posted by cupcakeninja at 7:28 AM on November 16 [1 favorite]
posted by cupcakeninja at 7:28 AM on November 16 [1 favorite]
well I'd like to consult Hellboy on this before coming to hasty conclusions
I enjoyed the depiction in Spirited Away
posted by ginger.beef at 8:56 AM on November 16 [5 favorites]
I enjoyed the depiction in Spirited Away
posted by ginger.beef at 8:56 AM on November 16 [5 favorites]
They probably just googled "Russian boogeyman" and Baba Yaga was the first result. It sounds cool and for most people it'll be their first exposure to the name so it works for the movie's purposes and they just ignore the description.
Throughout all the movies people get told that John Wick is coming for them and they often react by uttering *the Baba Yaga* under their breath and nervously look around. Because he's such a good assassin that he could step out of any shadow at any time even if it seems impossible.
The sequels get really weird expanding on a whole international organization weirdly antiquated and ceremonial interactions. They're really just ways to move from one very well done action scene to the next. The stunt work in those movies is next level.
But the first movie is almost perfect. All we know is some Russian mobsters break into some guy's house and kill his puppy. Said guy then proceeds to have a very reasonable reaction and response.
posted by VTX at 8:59 AM on November 16 [6 favorites]
Throughout all the movies people get told that John Wick is coming for them and they often react by uttering *the Baba Yaga* under their breath and nervously look around. Because he's such a good assassin that he could step out of any shadow at any time even if it seems impossible.
The sequels get really weird expanding on a whole international organization weirdly antiquated and ceremonial interactions. They're really just ways to move from one very well done action scene to the next. The stunt work in those movies is next level.
But the first movie is almost perfect. All we know is some Russian mobsters break into some guy's house and kill his puppy. Said guy then proceeds to have a very reasonable reaction and response.
posted by VTX at 8:59 AM on November 16 [6 favorites]
That's a nice piece of work. I only skimmed the thesis writeup but it's interesting seeing all the details of a character development process.
I've been keeping an eye on REKA, a cozy base-building videogame in early access.
Bonus link: Mussorgsky's Baba Yaga.
posted by Nelson at 12:19 PM on November 16 [2 favorites]
I've been keeping an eye on REKA, a cozy base-building videogame in early access.
Channel your inner witch! Build your cozy chicken-legged hut, practice witchcraft, and forage for ingredients in autumnal woodlands. Solve quests & uncover the great mysteries of the legendary witch Baba Jaga…It's mostly about the hut, I'm not sure if the pestle makes an appearance.
Bonus link: Mussorgsky's Baba Yaga.
posted by Nelson at 12:19 PM on November 16 [2 favorites]
I do love Ravel's orchestration, but I REALLY love the original solo piano, link.
posted by Gygesringtone at 1:22 PM on November 16 [1 favorite]
posted by Gygesringtone at 1:22 PM on November 16 [1 favorite]
What a cool thesis (and amazing art). I loved reading about her process. Thanks for sharing this!
posted by mixedmetaphors at 1:35 PM on November 16
posted by mixedmetaphors at 1:35 PM on November 16
The plot of one of the greatest fantasy novels in many years, Naomi Novik's Uprooted, turns on a Baba Yaga axis.
posted by jamjam at 2:09 PM on November 16 [2 favorites]
posted by jamjam at 2:09 PM on November 16 [2 favorites]
Seconding the Hellboy take on Baba Yaga, where she went from a random monster in a Hellboy short comic to one of the overarching presences in the story. Over time, Mignola expands her role and story, and gives a terrifying monster who eats children a depth, and finally, a deep sadness and sense of loss that's one of the things that makes the Hellboy series so profoundly good.
posted by Ghidorah at 3:04 PM on November 16 [1 favorite]
posted by Ghidorah at 3:04 PM on November 16 [1 favorite]
This is very cool—thank you for posting it! I enjoyed the author’s description of why she chose Baba Yaga, and her exploration in the lit review of what Baba Yaga represents and how she evolves through the tales.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 3:07 PM on November 16
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 3:07 PM on November 16
Creating an actual image of Baba Yaga reduces her scariness, which may be good or bad depending on who you want to scare. Baba Yaga comes in the night, dark, you never see her, she is gone before a selfie can be taken, even if it is your last selfie.
posted by sammyo at 3:58 PM on November 16
posted by sammyo at 3:58 PM on November 16
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posted by mittens at 6:07 AM on November 16 [5 favorites]