Mikhail Abelevich Kaufman (; 1897 – March 11, 1980) was a Soviet and Russian

cinematographer The cinematographer or director of photography (sometimes shortened to DP or DOP) is the person responsible for the recording of a film, television production, music video or other live-action piece. The cinematographer is the chief of the camera ...

and

photographer A photographer (the Greek φῶς (''phos''), meaning "light", and γραφή (''graphê''), meaning "drawing, writing", together meaning "drawing with light") is a person who uses a camera to make photographs. Duties and types of photograp ...

. He was the younger brother of filmmaker

Dziga Vertov Dziga Vertov (born David Abelevich Kaufman; – 12 February 1954) was a Soviet pioneer documentary film and newsreel director, as well as a cinema theorist. His filming practices and theories influenced the cinéma vérité style of documentary ...

(Denis Kaufman) and the older brother of cinematographer

Boris Kaufman Boris Abelevich Kaufman, A.S.C. (; August 24, 1906 – June 24, 1980) was a Russian-born American cinematographer and the younger brother of Soviet filmmakers Dziga Vertov and Mikhail Kaufman. Life and career Kaufman was born into a family of ...

.Petric, Vlada. ''Constructivism in Film: The Man with a Movie Camera.'' NY: Cambridge UP, 1987.

Early life

He was born into a family of

Jew Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

ish intellectuals living in

Białystok Białystok is the largest city in northeastern Poland and the capital of the Podlaskie Voivodeship. It is the List of cities and towns in Poland, tenth-largest city in Poland, second in terms of population density, and thirteenth in area. Biał ...

Grodno Governorate Grodno Governorate was an administrative-territorial unit (''guberniya'') of the Northwestern Krai of the Russian Empire, with its capital in Grodno. It encompassed in area and consisted of a population of 1,603,409 inhabitants by 1897. Gro ...

, at the time when the Białystok region was a part of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

Career

In the 1920s, after Mikhail Kaufman returned from the

Russian Civil War The Russian Civil War () was a multi-party civil war in the former Russian Empire sparked by the 1917 overthrowing of the Russian Provisional Government in the October Revolution, as many factions vied to determine Russia's political future. I ...

, Vertov offered him the opportunity to participate in his

newsreel A newsreel is a form of short documentary film, containing news, news stories and items of topical interest, that was prevalent between the 1910s and the mid 1970s. Typically presented in a Movie theater, cinema, newsreels were a source of cu ...

series ''

Kino-Pravda ''Kino-Pravda'' () was a series of 23 newsreels by Dziga Vertov, Elizaveta Svilova, and Mikhail Kaufman launched in June 1922. Vertov referred to the twenty-three issues of ''Kino-Pravda'' as the first work by him where his future cinematic meth ...

'' as a cameraman. Mikhail Kaufman directed photography for several films, including Vertov's '' Man with the Movie Camera'' (1929). The film is built around

meta-reference Meta-reference (or metareference) is a category of self-references occurring in many media or media artifacts like published texts/documents, films, paintings, TV series, comic strips, or video games. It includes all references to, or comments o ...

and is full of innovative visual effects: in it, Kaufman acts as a cameraman and is seen shooting the film while walking on high bridges, hanging off the side of a train, climbing a smokestack and crawling underground with miners – all in order to get the best shot. His brother's wife,

Yelizaveta Svilova Yelizaveta Ignatevna Svilova (, rendered in Latin as Elizaveta Svilova) (5 September 1900, Moscow – 11 November 1975, Moscow) was a Russian filmmaker and film editor. She is perhaps best known for making films with her husband Dziga Vertov and ...

, was editor and part of the "Council of Three" who "proclaimed a 'death sentence' on the cinema that came before, faulting it for mixing in 'foreign matter' from theater and literature.Lim, Dennis (April 8, 2011)
Machine Age Poet, Born in Revolution, Stifled Under Stalin.
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' Mikhail Kaufman directed three films: ''Moscow'' (1927), '' In Spring'' (1929), and ''An Unprecedented Campaign'' (1931). Shortly after the filming of ''Man with the Movie Camera'', Kaufman and Vertov fell out over artistic differences. The two would never work together again. Kaufman died on March 11, 1980, in

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

. His brother Boris died 3 months later.

References

External links

*
The Man with a Movie Camera
at nottingham.ac.uk

by MARKO DANIEL

1897 births 1980 deaths People from Białystok People from Belostoksky Uyezd Jews from the Russian Empire Soviet cinematographers Soviet photographers {{cinematographer-stub