- Andrejew's production drawings are today in the collections in France and Great Britain, they also appear on art auctions and offering by the commercial galleries in France. Cinémathèque Française in Paris presented several of Andrejew's gouaches during the exhibition 'Le cinéma expressionniste allemand - Splendeurs d'une collection (French Expressionist Cinema - Splendors of the Collection) ' - held in winter of 2007. They were collected by Lotte H. Eisner, German film historian living in France, who documented for the Cinémathèque works of the most important Filmarchitekte of the German expressionist cinema.
- French writer Lucie Derain described Andrejew at the peak of his career as "an artist of the grand style, blessed with a vision of lyrical quality.".
- He had a distinctive, innovative style. His décors were both expressive and realistic.
- After the second war he remained in England for the time being.
- After the studies, André Andrejew worked as a scene designer at the Konstantin Stanislavski's Moscow Art Theatre.
- In Alexander the Great (1956), Andrejew successfully used existing elements of primitive Spanish architecture to create the richness and glory of ancient Greece and Persia in far more authentic way, than the plaster and plywood decorations in similar Hollywood films of the time. Andrejew's ideas were continued a decade later in the mythological films directed by Pier Paolo Pasolini, Edipo re (Oedipus Rex, 1967) with the production design by Luigi Scaccianoce, and Medea (1969) with the production design by Dante Ferretti.
- When G.W. Pabst went to France to shoot the movie "Don Quichote" (1933) he took Andrejew to France with him. He remained abroad and he was responsible as a production designer for French and English movies.
- His last cinematical works for the German film came at the beginning of the 30s .
- He was one of the most important art directors of the international cinema of the twentieth century.
- In 1921/1922, he designed stage decorations for the Jasha Jushny's Der Blaue Vogel (Blue Bird), a legendary Russian émigré cabaret at Goltzstrasse in Berlin.
- Like many other Russians he had to leave his home country because of the October Revolution and he came to Berlin where he soon gained a foothold at the theater.
- Edith C. Lee wrote recently: "Believing in creative freedom rather than academic reconstruction, André Andrejew fulfilled the 20th century's notion of the romantic, individualistic artist. The unusual titillated his imagination.".
- He studied architecture at the Fine Arts Academy in Moscow. At the time in Russia, architecture could be studied at technical universities and with the more artistic angle at art academies, where accent was on interior design and decor and students were trained as artists.
- His last works as a productions designer came in Germany into being again with "Bonjour Kathrin" (1956) and "Madeleine und der Legionär" (1958).
- He joined the film business in 1923 and he was the production designer for the movie "Raskolnikow" .
- He created the sets for performances at Max Reinhardt's "Deutsches Theater".
- In 1923, he designed his first cinema décor for Raskolnikow, directed by Robert Wiene, film based upon Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment. This expressionist work made him the foremost art director in Germany. Rudolf Kurtz in his Expressionismus und Film (1926) wrote: Andrejew is a typical Moscow mixture, distinction of the streaked folk art (his decors) dissolves the rhythm of images, creates gentle forms, establishes balance even when everything is broken and torn. The French ban on Le Corbeau was lifted only in 1969.
- In 1943, André Andrejew worked as a production designer on Le Corbeau, a thriller by Henri-Georges Clouzot. This anti-authoritarian film became very controversial during the occupation, when it was seen as indirectly attacking the Nazi system, and censored; yet after the liberation of France in August 1944, Le Corbeau was perceived as being made by collaborators, and it was rumored to have been released in Germany as Nazi anti-French propaganda, when in fact it was suppressed by the Germans.
- Especially interesting is today The Threepenny Opera (1930), directed by G.W. Pabst. Andrejew built for this film huge sets of the imaginary London. These decors artistically continue German Expressionism of the 1920s, but bring it to another level, creating the world far more realistic, intense and somber.
- The production designer Andrej Andrejew joined the academy of arts in Moscow where he studied architecture, afterwards he began his professional career as a set designer at the Stanislawski theater.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content