Depicting Ordinary People   -My duty is to depict the everyday life of an ordinary person, says Fyodor Khitruk. - As an animator, my job, or rather my duty, is to depict the feelings, the sufferings and the everyday life of an ordinary person, says Fyodor Khitruk, the honorary guest of the film festival. The grand old man of the animation has lived in Germany for years, and this is his second visit to Tampere. The surroundings had a great effect for a teenage boy. - I studied, drew and read extensively, also detective stories. A good deal of my time I spent in a zoo with my sketch book with me. I learnt German very quickly; the first time I read the Gospels I read them in German. They influenced me a lot. Once, a drawing competition was held in the convent school I attended. The assignment was to draw a series on the Nativity story. Animation requires a lot Khitruk became an animator quite accidentally. After he returned to Moscow, the young man continued his studies on illustration. Once, a colleague of his suggested to Khitruk that he should also try animation. - He gave me an address to a studio, which was completely unknown at the time. I frequently popped into the place to ask for a job. By and by, I started to think that - goodness me! - animation requires its maker to be an artist, a writer, a dancer and a musician. At some point, I had dreamed about all of these professions, and now I realised that as an animator, I could be all of them at the same time. In the autumn of 1937, the studio looked for assistants for an animation production. All in all, 30 persons arrived to the entrance examination. I was chosen, probably because I drew so quickly. The History of Crime startled people The History of Crime from 1962 is the first direction by Khitruk. Khitruk startled people with this animation which was meant for adults. For the first time, the values of the Russians were questioned. - When I'm making a movie, I don't think of what I want it to be like or what I want it to say. I just want to express the sufferings I and other people have had - the disrespectful behaviour towards another person. The artist does not have to know what she or he wants to say with the work. That's for the critics to decide. War is the biggest crime   - War hammers the mind and the morals. So, what is the biggest crime of mankind? The master of animation stops to think for a moment. - War. It's all about killing at the frontline and decaying of society. It creates new disasters. It hammers the mind and the morals. It makes killing a norm. In 1966, Khitruk's animation Man in Frame was completed. The film is a story of a person who voluntarily creates frames for himself. If he does not fit into those frames, he gradually becomes agitated. - In the middle of the 1960s a friend of mine wanted to make an animation about a man who always wants to get rid of the frames surrounding him. Time passed by, and I forgot the whole thing. Once I asked him, if he was going to make that film. He had given up the idea, so I suggested my friend that he exchanged his idea for a bottle of brandy. We made a deal, and finally also the film. It became more impressive than I had expected. Music is another foot of animation Music plays a big part in Khitruk's animations. It creates the atmosphere and supports the action. Khitruk describes music as the second dramaturgy. - If we think that the animation stands on two feet, the other one of them is definitely music. Without music, the animation is crippled. - Composing the music for an animation is very demanding. You have to compose not only good music, but also music that's perfect for the film's atmosphere. I think that the music in Man in Frame works very well. It's very powerful, robot-like. Russian soul What is the much-talked Russian soul like? - The Russian soul is an enigma! Everyone - writers, poets and artists have tried to solve that, but none has delved into it like Dostoyevski, says Khitruk. - It is both good and evil, unforgotten and forgotten. You cannot understand Russia, you can only have faith in it. During the Stalin era artists, musicians and writers were under observation. The animators were left alone - after all, they only made films for the children. - There were people, however, who scrutinized our work. They were asking why a teddy-bear's shirt was red, what we wanted to say with that. Money and freedom Perestroika and glasnost brought along porn films and thrillers. The art became more dependent on money. - Standing against the wind gives me plenty of energy.   - There's a Russian proverb, which says that the one who pays for the food, gets to pick the music. Previously, the government took care of both the food and the music, nowadays it doesn't provide the food - and the music is chosen by people we don't know. They are the directors of big companies, the owners of television companies and newspapers. During the Soviet era prevailed a system which hold the society under its terror for decades. Each unconsidered word could mean danger. Suddenly all prohibitions, censorship and restrictions were gone. - You can say out loud what ever you want to, you can even have a demonstration on the street. But a person who has all his life been a slave does not know how to use this freedom when he finally gets it. He thinks that he can do anything he wants to. You have to know how to use your freedom right. We have never known how to do that. Freedom of speech, which is so much debated over at the moment, means that the politicians reveal each other's escapades on the papers. Standing against the wind makes stronger Once again, Winnie-the-Pooh philosophy raises its head in Khitruk - When the wind blows straight to my chest, against me, I have plenty of energy. When the wind blows from my back, that energy disappears. During the period of tight censorship, we struggled with all our might to get our voice heard. But now that everything's allowed, the strive has vanished. It's like one French writer once said: an artist must always be a little hungry. Right? Text: Kaisa Korpela Photo: Lassi Karppinen Translation: Leena Hyttinen Editor and photographer travelled with Fjodor Hitruk and his wife by train from Riihimäki to Tampere. An Animator is a Small-Scale Creator Saturday: Animations of Fyodor Khitruk at Tullikamari Pakkahuone at 8 pm. Saturday: Document by Otto Alder The Master of Animation Fyodor Khitruk at the Studio of Tampere house at 6 pm.

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