VUFKU (All-Ukrainian Photo Cinema Administration) existed for less than nine years (1922-1930), but it managed to release over 140 fiction films, several hundreds of non-fiction films and newsreels, dozens of animations, gain fame of “Ukrainian Hollywood,” and take under its control all aspects of the cinematic process – filmmaking, distribution, film press, propaganda, and education. From over 140 full-length fiction films made by VUFKU, about 60 films are considered lost. A lot of the surviving films have come down to us incomplete (without one or more parts).

The website VUFKU. Lost&Found is the first online collection of Dovzhenko-Centre’s media library and is perhaps the only online resource providing comprehensive information on VUFKU.

The mission of the VUFKU. Lost&Found project is to search and return to Ukraine the lost films of the 1920s. Traces of some of the lost films of that time can be found in international archives. Meanwhile, we are collecting archive materials about the lost films, restoring their contents, learning the context of their release.

These searches and analysis, restoration of films and their return to the cultural circulation require financial support. Donating to our fundraising campaign, which will start in October 2019, you will be able to contribute to the restoration of Ukrainian cinema.

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Library Arrow

In Spring (DVD)

In Spring is a masterpiece of Ukrainian cinema avant-garde, a non-fiction film made by Mikhail Kaufman, Dziga Vertov’s brother and co-author, along the lines of the avantgardist theory of «cine-eye». The film shows Kyiv in 1929, almost unknown today. Pictures of wakening city, its resurging life resonate with lyrical views of reviving nature. Kaufman’s attentive camera dwells deliberately on smiling faces of children, lyrically depicting a declaration of love to Kyiv. In In Spring, Kaufman used the method of «hidden camera» for the first time.

Soundtrack to the film was composed by Oleksandr Kokhanovsky, who also created music to a series of experimental theatrical productions, movies, art performances and other artistic events.

Georges Sadoul, a French cinema writer
Mikhail Kaufman’s In Spring (1929) is more of a cinematic poem than a documentary. In 1930 in Ukraine, this film as well as Earth made a profound impression on us. With In Spring, we have discovered a totally new form of documentary cinema, a cine-poem, where the lyric theme of thaw and swelling buds accompanied the advancement of USSR towards socialism without concealing still existing survivals of the past. I saw this film thirty-seven years ago but still keep unforgettable memories of it.

Remastered version + new soundtrack

16 pages booklet (English, Ukrainian)

Cost: 75 uah

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