A belated premiere

A new chapter for the animation history books

The official centenary of Russian cinema was on 15 October 2008. The discovery of films made by dancer, choreographer, teacher and amateur filmmaker, Alexander Shiryaev (1867-1941) between 1906 and 1909 are creating waves in cinema history.

Shiryaev was a perfectionist in every field of his interest and he worked as a teacher until well into his 70s. Alongside this dedication he spent his spare time mastering photography and film-making, model-making and animation in the earliest years of these art forms. He proves that, if actors exercise their memories using emotion and words, then dancers have a muscle memory for movement.

In 20 years as a dancer with the Marinsky Theatre in St Petersburg, Shiryaev took on all the male character parts. In his eagerness to pass on these dances to future generations he offered to use his keen amateur skills as a filmmaker to document the popular scenes of the day. His request for permission to film was refused. It is the official letter of rejection that sparked an interest with archivist and documentary director, Viktor Bocharov, who went on to make the startling discovery of the long-lost footage that was unveiled at Encounters to UK audiences for the first time.

Perhaps it is this refusal that spurred Shiryaev on to make his own films, starting with films of himself dancing the popular roles of the day, and eventually to documenting all the dances he knew, using puppet characters that he had crafted himself from papier mache and soft wire. Shiryaev filmed not just one character at a time, but whole casts of characters each with their own personality and movements. It was a feat of dedication. One Harlequin's dance sequence used over 7000 individual stop-motion shots. Family members have recollected that, in his filming room, the parquetry floor was completely worn on the pathway between camera and puppet theatre!

A perfectionist's obsession and a mastery of movement were the keys to capturing such detailed movements (as Director, Viktor Bocharov, said: ‘Movement was in his blood') But how did he achieve effects such as pirouettes and leaps into the air? Aardman's Peter Lord was on hand to offer his expertise, but even he had to admit that, unless you examine the footage over and over you will never see the tiny pin holes in the sets, clues to Shiryaev's pioneering techniques.

While unfortunately, none of Shiryaev's puppets or sets survived the two World Wars, thanks to the dedicated work of Viktor Bocharov, we can all be enthralled by Shiryaev's work today.

Bocharov's documentary is available on DVD, and a new book ‘Alexander Shiryaev: Master of movement' by Bocharov, Robinson and Beumers, is due to be published this Autumn. See http://www.cinetecadelfriuli.org/pubblicazioni/libri/libri2001-2010.html