‘Pravda’ newspaper, axe and bones, 1984
Vladimir Vorobiev/MAMM/MDFRussian babushkas never give up and defy all stereotypes. People say they can stop a running horse and enter a burning house. They raise their grandchildren, keep the house in order, never complain about life and always try to stay positive! And here is photo evidence of their endless energy!
Museum guards
Vladimir Vorobiev/MAMM/MDFTwo old women having small talk
Vladimir Vorobiev/MAMM/MDFAn old saleswoman in the GUM department store in Moscow
Semen Mishin-Morgenstern/MAMM/MDFAn old woman from Chukotka
Dmitry Baltermanz/MAMM/MDFAn old woman knitting, 1949
Georgy Lipskerov/MAMM/MDFA countryside cyclist and an old woman with a yoke, 1979
Vladimir Sokolaev/MAMM/MDFA peasant woman during World War II
Arkady Shaikher/Private collection“Once upon a time there lived an old woman and an old man”
I.Lagunov/The State historical Museum of Southern Ural“Don’t worry!”
Rustam Mukhametzyanov/Rustam Mukhametzyanov archiveAn old woman holding a sheaf of grain
Leonid Shokin/MAMM/MDFA grandma cleaning mushrooms she just picked
L.Zhaleiko/A.Sologubova collectionAn old woman posing on a tractor
Mikhail Prishvin/State Literature MuseumAn old woman posing in a headscarf, 1870s
A.Krasovsky/MAMM/MDFLeo Tolstoy and his wife Sofya
Leo Tolstoy State MuseumA peasant woman hauling her disabled son near Sarov Monastery, 1903
‘K.E.von Hahn and Ko’ photo studio/Sarov Monastery museumMaria Polenova with Alisa the horse. Pavlovskoye estate
Boris Kustodiev/Astrakhan State Art gallery‘The Exodus’ After the Nazis aviation bombed Murmansk
Yevgeny Khaldei/MAMM/MDFAn old woman sitting on a bench, 1956
Yevgeny Khaldei/MAMM/MDFA grandmother and her ‘little’ grandson, 1960s
Anatoly Boldin/MAMM/MDFAn old woman selling potatoes at a railway station somewhere in the Urals, 1974
Dmitry Vozdvizhensky, Nina Sviridova/MAMM/MDFA group of old women on a holiday in a village, 1978
Denis Tyulenev archiveIf using any of Russia Beyond's content, partly or in full, always provide an active hyperlink to the original material.
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