Artur Berger

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Artur Berger , also Arthur Berger and after the emigration Artur Semenovic or Semenowitsch (born May 27, 1892 in Vienna , † January 11, 1981 in Moscow ) was an Austrian film architect and set designer . During his creative time in Austria from 1920 to 1936 he worked for around 30 feature films. He then emigrated to Moscow in the Soviet Union, where he continued to make films until 1970.

Live and act

Artur Berger was born in Vienna in 1892 to the Jewish parents Simon, who was a private civil servant, and Pauline Berger (née Beran). He attended the Graphische Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt and from 1911 to 1915 the University of Applied Arts in Vienna , where he was trained by the respected Art Nouveau architects Josef Hoffmann and Oskar Strnad . In 1919 he resigned from the Israelite religious community .

Artur Berger initially worked with his brother Josef Berger and Martin Ziegler on the residential building program of the Red Vienna , but switched to Sascha-Film in 1920 to work as an architect for sets and film structures. For the directors Michael Curtiz and Alexander Korda he co- designed the monumental films Prinz und Bettelknabe (1920), The Young Medardus (1923), Harun al Raschid (1924), The Slave Queen (1924) and Salammbô (1924). He often worked with Emil Stepanek and Julius von Borsody . From the mid- 1920s , however, he was only active in inconsequential melodramas and entertainment films. In 1926 he furnished Die Pratermizzi , in 1927 he was once again responsible for the backdrops and buildings of a successful production: Café Elektric by Gustav Ucicky .

In 1932 he directed a campaign film for the state elections for the Social Democrats: The vom 17er Haus . The selenophone tone process was used. The socially utopian film is set in 2032, in which numerous skyscrapers with glass facades surround St. Stephen's Cathedral . In order not to let this terrible vision of a city unworthy of living occur, the Viennese should act according to the motto at the end of the film: “Be clever! Red Vienna wins! Vote social democratic! ” . In addition to Rossak's Mr. Pim's trip to Europe , this was only one of two social-democratic advertising films produced by the city's cinema management agency (Kiba) and at the same time the last before the party was banned in the Austrian corporate state .

In 1933 Berger co-founded the Institute for Sound Film Art in Vienna, where he also taught. He was also a member of the Austrian Werkbund and the Association of Austrian Artists and the Kunstschau / Sonderbund German-Austrian Artists . 1936 was when transferred to Austria on economic and political pressure from Nazi Germany whose work ban on Jews and Jewish-born people in the film industry, emigrated Artur Berger Prague and Paris to Moscow, where he under the pseudonym Artur Semenovich been transferred to the Meschrabpom -Filmstudios continued to work for the film.

Artur Berger had three sons, all of whom worked as architects in Austria, Russia and Tashkent , as well as a daughter.

Filmography

Awards

  • 1968: Honored Artist of the Soviet Union

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Berger, Artur
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Berger, Arthur; Semenovic, Artur; Semenovich
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian film architect and production designer
DATE OF BIRTH May 27, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH January 11, 1981
Place of death Moscow