Marina Bychkova

Marina Bychkova is a Russian doll maker. She says that as a child she became "became painfully aware and appalled at the mediocrity and the uninspired dullness of mass-produced dolls. This profound frustration coupled with my natural sensibilities inspired me to create my own dolls, suited to my own ideas of feminine beauty. A particular point of interest for me was not only the life-like articulation of the body, but also the beautiful balance between a delicate form and an extraordinary function of a doll."

She custom makes porcelain dolls for individual clients, who can choose all the detail down to eye and hair colour. However, she does state that ultimately, it is down to her to choose the final appearance of the doll. She has learnt a technique that works similar to tattoing skin, but you use an extremely sharp needle to scratch the surface of the porcelian and that fill it with special ink. However unlike tatoos, these never fade.

I love that her work not only works as individual beautiful scultpure pieces, but also function as a 'toy' or doll. These cost atleast £1,000 and the contrast between one of these delicate pieces and a normal plastic barbie is massive.