ANIMATION STUDIES

Dark side of Potemkin villages: Soviet animation film from animated campaigns to animation of meltin down in Fyodor Hitruk’s films

The history of Soviet animated film is closely linked to social and political changes and imperatives set out by the national Communist propaganda machine. The only way to understand the genealogy of Soviet animation is to put artistic achievements in the cultural context. The author explores how a historical framework and dominant artistic theories, often prescribed by decree, enabled the creation of some of the most acclaimed animated films in the entire world animation in the works of Yuriy Norshteyn and Fyodor Hitruk, and later also Priit Pärn and Igor Kovalyov. The text gives a panoramic picture of the entire history of Soviet animated film, filtering most important tendencies and most successful works.

Midhat Ajanović