If you ask us about memories from childhood, then one hundred percent of us all remember a favorite cartoon. Funny heroes, funny adventures and beautiful animation are what remains in memories forever. These days 90 years of Ukrainian animation – a phenomenon that had a fatal influence on the development of domestic cinematography, and ours with you today. In its origins there were many interesting personalities, among which, of course, there were Zhytomyr citizens
90 years ago in the young Ukrainian state there was an upsurge – the Renaissance of our twenties. Everybody was tired of the war, they still did not know the horrors of repression – the sea of ​​hopes and a surge of emotions. It was at those times inspired artists that created the first multimedia workshop in Ukraine based on the Odessa Film Factory and released the first Ukrainian animated film “Straw Bull”, written by Vyacheslav Levandovsky.
“Ukrainization”, “10”, “The Tale of the Protein-Husband and Mouse-Villain” – a wonderful embodiment of the talent of a person who was known in music, ballet, theater, painting, graphics, and most importantly – was able to grow wonderful students, one of which was Zhytomyr local Semen Guetskyi.
Semyon Guetsky was born in Zhytomyr in 1902. Little is known about his childhood: his father was an artisan, his mother was a housewife. The eleventh child in the family fell to the fate and hard work, and the war and the tribulation, and during the civil war, the 14-year-old Semeon was almost shot down. He developed the amazing vision of beauty and talent of the artist in Zhytomyr art technical school O. Kantserova, where he studied since 1921. Then until 1929 – Kyiv Art Institute, where the experiments were shared by F. Krichevsky, M. Boychuk, L. Kramarenko, and the work at the Kyiv Film Studio. There, a young multiplier artist, along with like-minded people, persistently studied the best achievements of those times demonstrated by colleagues – multipliers of the then Union, and world experience.
Particularly thoroughly studied the methods of Walt Disney, who triumphantly mastered the expanses of the film industry. He studied his technological and artistic achievements and added his own. In the early 1930s, Ukrainian animated “Murzilka in Africa” ​​was created. Semyon Guetsky and Yevgeniy Gorbach have mastered the new method for our territories, which served in Disney’s studio. His essence was that the character in motion was gradually painted on transparent sheets of celluloid, drawings alternately placed on stage on plain paper and filmed. This facilitated the shooting process, and gave great creative possibilities.
In collaboration with Eugene Gorbach and Hippolyte Lazarchuk in 1935, Guetskyi created the animation “Tuk-Tuk and his buddy Beetle”, which also shows the influence of Disney from “pictures” to some “gegens”. Recently, the Dovzhenko Center studio has restored the animation rarity that Zhytomyr dwellers can see on October 28 thanks to the initiative group “90 Years of Ukrainian Animation” with the assistance of Dovzhenko Center, Ukrainian film studio, Sasha Danilenko and Oleg Shcherba and Ivan Kapitonov .
And in the 30’s, ambitious Ukrainian artists wanted to create bulky and colorful cartoons, as reported in 1936 in the Soviet Cinema magazine: “The Kiev Film Studio is preparing for the production of a colored cartoon.” Z. Marshak recalled: “Very talented artists who came to the cartoon from the artistic institute and college have always sought to create bright and original cartoons.”
Another masterpiece of the animation of the 30’s was “The Magic Ring” – independent directing work by Semen Guetsky. Unfortunately, the epic drama film has not survived; we only have the impression of Boris Kryzhanivskyi: “It really was very beautifully done. With great taste, without sentimentality and excessive styling. The film cleared out approaches to the creation of national in the form of drawn pictures, reaching their roots in folk art. But the film “The Magic Ring” was unfairly declared as a manifestation of “Ukrainian bourgeois nationalism” and placed on a shelf. The director-painter had to leave the studio. ”
Zhytomyr citizen Guetskyi lived a long and interesting life. The veteran of the war, a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR, skillfully created images reflecting the era. His works of art were distributed in various galleries and private collections around the world, and they are also in the Zhytomyr Museum of Local Lore.
But the first animated works by Guetskyi are the foundation of domestic animation. And because of 90 long years, pride is felt for a fellow countryman who stood at the source of our cartoon creation – the world of childhood, which we carry through all our lives.
According to the texts of A. Kanivets, I. Kapitonov
Translated by Aliona Matushevich