Традиция и национален дух в немската силуетна изрезкова анимация от XX век
Tradition and National Spirit in 20th Century German Silhouette Cut-out Animation

Summary/Abstract: This article reveals the history of two traditional arts employing the aesthetics of the silhouette, their development in Germany and their connections to the 20th century new artistic medium of animation. From around the 17th century, a peculiar obsession based on folklore traditions borrowed from the East began to develop in German culture – the attraction to the silhouette. Over time, silhouette cut-outs (die scherenschnitte), silhouette portraits and theatrical shadow play with flat silhouette marionettes became a kind of trademark for Germany. Although considered a second-class type of arts, they occupied a vivid part of bourgeois life in the cultural Weimar salons. Because of the influence of Realism and the increasingly widespread distribution of the new medium of photography, such silhouette cut-outs lost their popularity for several decades in the middle of the 19th century. With the advent of modernist and more experimental pursuits in art, the attraction to the somewhat abstract essence of the black silhouette started to return. At the beginning of the 20th century there was a strong revival of the forgotten interest in die scherenschnitte by various scholars and publishers in Germany. At that time, the new technology of the cinema completely captivated the young master of such silhouette cut-outs – Lotte Reiniger, who became the most famous pioneer of silhouette cut-out animation in the world, a legend in the history of animation art in Germany and a true inspiration for the next generations of animation directors both in her native Germany and in other countries. Film advertising pioneer and producer Julius Pinschewer was also drawn to the national sensibility of the silhouette style and began using the silhouette animation technique in his commercials. The first non-commercial and self-financed film that he created Chad Gadjo – Ein Lämmchen (1930), illustrates the Jewish legend-poem of the same name, which contains various interpretations and symbolism, especially considering the historical time in which the film was made. Bruno Böttge, inspired by Reiniger, also used the silhouette cut-out animation technique, emphasizing its inherited connection with the centuries-old paper arts in the German folk tradition and following the general trend of implementing a national style in East German cinema from that time. A group of young directors – his students and followers, continued the cut-out silhouette tradition in German animated cinema until the disbandment of DEFA in the early 90s.

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