For the poster I was excited and already had in mind which countries I would be more interested in working on. My choice was based on which country I was more inclined to share my knowledge. I chose Russian, soviet era animation with the goal of showing a more vibrant and joyful side of it. After sharing the animations I knew from my childhood, with my team members, we decided to talk about the joy these animations brought to children and adults.

I explored the golden age and decided to focus on the studio Soyuzmultfilm and look at their golden collection which was all their well-known animations that were a success with the public to this day. I research three of those showing the evolution the studio went through with the messages and ideas behind there creations, and through that show how exactly they managed to bring this joy and now nostalgia to people.

 

I started off with research on Soyuzmultfilm. I was familiar with a lot of animations created by them as I’ve watched them many times in my life, but never got curious to search about the studio’s history, so it was still a learning experience. Although this was not the main focus of my part of the presentation it would still be beneficial to understand the inspiration of the directors, and the reasoning behind creations. Thus, leading me to understand that they were founded in 1936 by the government at the time as well as funded by them, which is why they fell apart in 1990s given the government was falling apart itself. It was founded to make animations directed towards children while sharing the ideal of socialist realism, as well as animations directed towards their soldiers, but after Stalin’s reign around the 50s to the 80s that’s when they started creating the most memorable animations leading to the creation of a golden collection. They started off being educational and gradually we started having a variety, educational and animations with morals still existed but we also had animations that were simply for entertainment and animations questioning social philosophies such as Gamburg Y. (1976) Blue puppy.

 

I found it difficult to put into words why adults would enjoy it as much as children after some research and asking the adults in my life on their point of view they all seemed to insist how beautiful they found the art style used by Soyuzmultfilm, they enjoyed the vibrant yet soothing colours and almost realistic artwork which was created after the aesthetic change from being inspired by Disney to their own style.

The first animation I looked into was “bad grade again” made in 1957 by Boris Stepantev and Evgeny Raykovsky, it’s about a boy from a painting who learns and understands why he got such a low mark.  It’s a good example of how animations could be used as a different medium to encourage children in the academic world to be interested in doing better. In this case, in a way that is more enjoyable and fun, thanks to the use of satire, for example the boy being bad in geography thinks that the sunny beach and ice cream are in the north and instead get transported to an ice beach with ice cream. It is equally entertaining for children as it is to adults because of its relatable situation, as a parent to a child who is failing and being unable to understand how to help, as well as the child being in the same situation as the boy. Furthermore, the satire in this case being simple enough even for children to understand, and fun enough for adults brings both audiences together.

This second one is a short although I did not find much information on it, I felt it was easy to understand the concept. It was directed by Degtyarev Vladimir from 1967, it was made during the period where animations seemed to challenge social philosophical questions, in this case it was the opposite of what was wanted by socialist realism. The protagonist, a little train is late to work, takes his time and enjoys the beauty of nature around him, of the birds singing and the flowers blooming, encouraging the young passenger enjoy it with him. In parallel I felt one of the passengers which could very well represent the hard-working citizens at the time, being a punctual man dressed in a dark coloured suit worries about being late and wasting time. We can understand how this story is sweet and pretty for a child, but the message would go over their head. Adults on the other hand would probably understand this more and maybe even be touched by the message behind it which was most likely directed towards them.

Finally, “Nu pogodi!” “Just you wait!” is a series, directed by Gennady Sokolsky, Vyacheslav Kotyonochkin, Vladimir Tarasov, Aleksey Kotyonochkin and Andrey Zhidkov, about a wolf running after a rabbit, like Tom and Jerry. It is very loved by the people who grew up with it. The whole concept of this series, created by Aleksandr Kurlyandskyis, Arkady Khait and Felix Kandel, is very simple: it’s just amusing. What I have noticed although it is simply humorous, with the simplicity of not talking often and mostly having the catch phrase “Nu zayetz, nu pogodi!” said every time the rabbit gets away, there’s a lot of elements of daily life and culture included into it, which now became nostalgic. Such as popular music from the period like: “Grass by the home” by Zemlyane and “millions of scarlet roses lyrics” by alla pugacheva in episode 14, as well as a snack called boublik and a samovar which is a big container you boil water in, which you can see throughout the series. It’s very understandable how it was able to reach a wider audience, the simple humour and elements seen and heard in any individual at the times daily life.