15.09.1941 – now living

Today is the birthday of the director-animator, screenwriter and artist Yury Borisovich Norshtein. His most famous works – cartoons “Hedgehog in the Fog” and “Fairy Tale of Fairy Tales” – are recognized as the best animation works in the world. The secret of a special “Norshtein” image is the animation technique invented by him, in which flat paper figures are located on several glass layers, creating a volume effect. All the animation work of Yuri Borisovich is also remarkable for his picturesqueness, as is known, Norshtein originally planned to become an artist, but fate led him to the cartoon.

The future artist was born on September 15, 1941 in the village of Andreevka, Penza region, where his mother, Basya Girshevna Krichevskaya, was evacuated during the Great Patriotic War. In 1943, Yuri Norshtein returned to Moscow with his mother and older brother. His father, Boris Leibovich Norshtein, was at the front, he died in 1956.

In 1956-1958 years. Yuri Norshtein attended a children’s art school, and from 1959 to 1961 he studied at the courses of multiplier artists at the Soyuzmultfilm studio.

One of the masterpieces of Soviet animation – a cartoon by Yuri Norshtein “The Heron and the Crane” in 1974. The place of action, instead of the swamp supposed in the fairy tale, the artist uses the ruins of the Russian manor, and a simple Russian fairy tale is transformed. It opens completely new depths, delicate, elegant style of drawing in combination with manners and movements of characters, creates a story of lost greatness.

Yury Norstein’s films were awarded numerous international prizes. In 1984 in Los Angeles (USA) the film “Fairy tale of fairy tales” was recognized as the best film of all times and peoples. And in 2003 in Tokyo (Japan) the film “The Hedgehog in the Fog” is recognized as the best film of all time and people, the second film is the “Fairy Tale of Fairy Tales”.