The Motherland Calls:-

The Motherland Calls, (Russian: Родина-мать зовёт! "Rodina Mat' Zovyot!"), also called Mother Motherland, Mother Motherland Is Calling, simply The Motherland, or The Mamayev Monument, is a statue in Mamayev Kurgan in Volgograd, Russia commemorating the Battle of Stalingrad. The repetitive wording in the title "Mother Motherland" doesn't exist in Russian: the word for "Motherland", "Родина" is derived from "birth" and can be literally translated as "birth place".When the memorial was dedicated in 1967 it was the tallest sculpture in the world, measuring 85 meters (279 feet) from the tip of its sword to the top of the plinth. The figure itself measures 52 meters (170 feet), and the sword 33 meters (108 feet). Two-hundred steps, symbolizing the 200 days of the Battle of Stalingrad, lead from the bottom of the hill to the monument. The lead sculptor was Yevgeny Vuchetich (the famous Russian sculptor of Serbian descent), and the significant structural engineering challenges of the 7900 ton concrete[1] sculpture were handled by Nikolai Nikitin. The statue appears on both the current flag and coat of arms of Volgograd Oblast.The model who posed for Mother Motherland, Valentina Izotova, a native of the city, is still recognized for her resemblance to the statue. She was recruited by Lev Maistrenko, an artist who was working on the memorial complex in the early 1960s.According to some sources the statue was partially inspired by Winged Victory of Samothrace,[citation needed] with somewhat more extended drapery. Marshal of the Soviet Union Vasily Ivanovich Chuikov is buried in the area of the monument.The statue is currently leaning due to groundwater level changes causing movement of the foundations; the leaning is rapidly getting worse. The statue is not fixed to its foundations and is held in place only by its weight. It has moved by 20 centimeters and is not expected to be able to move much further without collapsing.

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