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Drawing the Iron Curtain
Jews and the Golden Age of Soviet Animation
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2016
About this book
In the American imagination, the Soviet Union was a drab cultural wasteland, a place where playful creative work and individualism was heavily regulated and censored. Yet despite state control, some cultural industries flourished in the Soviet era, including animation. Drawing the Iron Curtain tells the story of the golden age of Soviet animation and the Jewish artists who enabled it to thrive.
Art historian Maya Balakirsky Katz reveals how the state-run animation studio Soyuzmultfilm brought together Jewish creative personnel from every corner of the Soviet Union and served as an unlikely haven for dissidents who were banned from working in other industries. Surveying a wide range of Soviet animation produced between 1919 and 1989, from cutting-edge art films like Tale of Tales to cartoons featuring “Soviet Mickey Mouse” Cheburashka, she finds that these works played a key role in articulating a cosmopolitan sensibility and a multicultural vision for the Soviet Union. Furthermore, she considers how Jewish filmmakers used animation to depict distinctive elements of their heritage and ethnic identity, whether producing films about the Holocaust or using fellow Jews as models for character drawings.
Providing a copiously illustrated introduction to many of Soyuzmultfilm’s key artistic achievements, while revealing the tumultuous social and political conditions in which these films were produced, Drawing the Iron Curtain has something to offer animation fans and students of Cold War history alike.
Author / Editor information
MAYA BALAKIRSKY KATZ is a professor and chair of the art history department at Touro College, in New York. She is the author of The Visual Culture of Chabad and the editor of Revising Dreyfus.
Reviews
"A superbly researched treatise that will be of keen interest to readers of Soviet history, Jewish studies, and film history. Students of animation will take particular delight in the detailed explorations of Yuri Norstein’s famous film Tale of Tales and of Cheburashka, the phenomenally popular character also known as the Soviet Mickey Mouse."
— Library Journal"Drawing the Iron Curtain is an important contribution to Jewish studies, animation studies, and Russian studies"
— Lora Wheeler Mjolsness, Slavonic and East European Review"A noteworthy contribution to such disparate fields as animation history, Soviet cultural history, and Jewish studies, the author’s primary disciplinary affiliation".
— H-Net"Katz has written a very important book exploring an area of popular significance but little scholarly attention."
— David Shneer, University of Colorado-Boulder"Maya Balakirsky Katz’s new book is a welcome addition to Soviet animation studies"
"This book contains a significant amount of useful information, and I would ultimately recommend it... to all scholars of Soviet cinema and culture, and to all academic libraries with holdings in Russian and Soviet culture"
— Bella Ginzbursky-Blum, The Russian Review"This book contains a significant amount of useful information, and I would ultimately recommend it... to all scholars of Soviet cinema and culture, and to all academic libraries with holdings in Russian and Soviet culture"
"Drawing on their Jewish heritage" - an interview with Maya Balakirsky Katz <http://jewishstandard.timesofisrael.com/drawing-on-their-jewish-heritage/>
— The Jewish StandardTopics
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Frontmatter
i -
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CONTENTS
vii -
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Acknowledgments
ix -
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Note on Transliteration and Translation
xi -
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Introduction: Puppeteering a Self in the Soviet Union
1 -
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1. Behind the Scenes: Jews and the Studio System, 1919–1989
27 -
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2. Black and White: Race in Soviet Animation
56 -
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3. The Brumberg Sisters: The Fairy Grandmothers of Soviet Animation
75 -
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4. Big-City Jews: Setting and Censoring the Modern Fairy Tale
96 -
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5. Tropical Russian Bears: Cheburashka’s Jewish Roots
120 -
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6. The Pioneer’s Violin: Animating the Soviet Holocaust
153 -
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7. Cartoon Cosmopolitans: Drawing Jews into Soviet Culture
189 -
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8. Tale of Tales: The Rise of the Jewish Auteur Director
204 -
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Conclusion: Tell-Tale Signs and Soviet Jewish Animation
227 -
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Notes
233 -
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Filmography
271 -
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Index
277 -
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
286
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
September 2, 2019
eBook ISBN:
9780813577036
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook ISBN:
9780813577036
Keywords for this book
art; music; art history; architecture; animation; animators; history; world history; film; film studies; film history; film industry; media studies; communications; Jewish Studies; performing arts; film and video; video; history and criticism; Russian; Russia; Former Soviet Union; Soviet Union; design; art design; graphic arts; graphic design; illustration; Jewish history; jewish interest; Soyuzmultfilm; Tale of Tales; Soviet Mickey Mouse; Cheburashka; filmmakers; Jewish filmmakers; film production; Holocaust; Cold War; war history; military history; war; The Brumberg Sisters; Soviet Holocaust; cartoons
Audience(s) for this book
For an expert adult audience, including professional development and academic research
