Category Archives: Dziga Vertov

MIKHAIL KAUFMAN: portraits

Posted on 04/05/2022 by Opinionated Designer

Dziga Vertov’s experimental film ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ (VUFKU 1929) portrays a day in the life of an unnamed Soviet city in 1928. Filming the activities of its inhabitants at work and play the cinematographer (and Vertov’s brother) Mikhail … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, Constructivism, Dziga Vertov, Film studios, Man with a Movie Camera, Photography, silent film, Soviet film, Ukraine, Uncategorized | Tagged City symphony, Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, Mikhail Kaufman, Photography, Soviet silent film, Ukrainian film, VUFKU | Comments Off

VUFKU 100

Posted on 13/03/2022 by Opinionated Designer

100th anniversary of the All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Administration The All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Adminstration (Vse-Ukrains’ke Foto Kino Upravlinnia, ВУФКУ – Всеукраїнське фоtокіноуправління) was founded on the 13th March 1922 by the National Commissar of Education of the Ukrainian SSR. Lenin realised … Continue reading →

Posted in Cinema, Constructivism, Dziga Vertov, Film studios, Man with a Movie Camera, silent film, Soviet film, Ukraine, Uncategorized | Tagged Goskino, Man with a Movie Camera, Oleksandr Dovzhenko, Oleksandr Dovzhenko Centre, silent film, Soviet silent film, Sovkino, Soyuzkino, Ukrainfilm, Ukrainian cinema, VUFKU | Comments Off

MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA: trainspotting!

Posted on 11/12/2020 by Opinionated Designer

‘Long live the poetry of the propelling and propelled machine, the poetry of levers, wheels, and steel wings1, the iron screech of movements, the dazzling grimaces of red-hot jets.’ From: ‘We. A Version of a Manifesto’, Dziga Vertov, Kino-Fot no. … Continue reading →

Posted in Camera, Cameras, Cinema, Constructivism, Dziga Vertov, Man with a Movie Camera, silent film, Soviet film, Steam locomotives, Uncategorized | Tagged agit train, Debrie Parvo camera, Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, Man with a Movie Camera, Mikhail Kaufman, Soviet locomotives, Steam trains in Russia, Trains in Man with a Movie Camera | Comments Off

MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA: reflections

Posted on 24/11/2020 by Opinionated Designer

Studying ‘Man with a Movie Camera’ carefully, shot by shot, for two previous posts on the locations and cameras, I was struck by the repetition of reflected and reversed images throughout the film from the first dramatic view of the … Continue reading →

Posted in Camera, Cameras, Cinema, Constructivism, Dziga Vertov, Man with a Movie Camera, silent film, Soviet film, Uncategorized | Tagged Cine-Eye, Debrie Parvo, Dziga Vertov, кино-глаз, Elizaveta Svilova, Flopped Shot, Kinamo, Kino-Eye, Kino-Glaz, Krauss Zeiss Tessar lens, Left-Right Reversal, Man with a Movie Camera, Mikhail Kaufman, Mirror reversal, Reflected shots | Comments Off

MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA: the first cinema screening

Posted on 24/09/2020 by Opinionated Designer

In the spring of 1927 Dziga Vertov* moved to Kyiv to work for VUFKU, the All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Adminstration (Vse-Ukrains’ke Foto Kino Upravlinnia, ВУФКУ – Всеукраїнське фоtокіноуправління) after being sacked by Sovkino, the Russian equivalent, for being over budget on … Continue reading →

Posted in Camera, Cameras, Cinema, Constructivism, Design, Dziga Vertov, Man with a Movie Camera, Photography, silent film, Soviet film, Uncategorized | Tagged Berlin, Der Mann mit der Kamera, Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, Express Cinema, Film und Foto Exhibition, Goskino No. 1 Cinema, Goskino No. 2 Cinema, Hermitage Cinema, K. Liebnecht Cinema, Kharkiv, Kharkiv Historical Museum, Kyiv, Man with a Movie Camera, Marmorhaus Cinema, Mikhail Kaufman, Moscow, Museum of Moscow, Odesa, Oleksandr Dovzhenko Centre, Palace Hotel, Shantser Cinema, Tverskaia 46 Cinema, VUFKU | Comments Off

MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA: the film locations

Posted on 29/06/2020 by Opinionated Designer

1929 poster for the film by the Stenberg brothers ‘We leave the film studio for life, for that whirlpool of colliding visible phenomena, where everything is real, where people, tramways, motorcycles, and trains meet and part, where each bus follows … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Cinema, Constructivism, Design, Dziga Vertov, Man with a Movie Camera, silent film, Soviet film, Uncategorized | Tagged Arcadia Beach, Bakhmetevsky Bus Garage, Bolshoi Theatre, Boulevard Stairs, Coal Mine, Debrie Parvo movie camera, Documentary film, Donbas, Donbass, Donetsk, Dziga Vertov, Eisenstein, Elizaveta Svilova, Experimental film, Film locations, Iron foundry, Kamianske, Kiev, Kinamo, Kulyanik, Kuznetsky Most, Kyiv, Man with a Movie Camera, Mikhail Kaufman, Moscow, Odesa, Photography, Potemkin Stairs, Pushkins'ka Street, Soviet Silent Movies, Steelworks, Strastnaya Square, The Eleventh Year, Tverskaya, Volkhov Hydroelectric Plant | Comments Off