Semyon Solomonovich Mandel (Russian: Семен Соломонович Мандель, 27 October 1907 – 19 September 1974) was a prominent Soviet/Russian theatre and film production designer and art director.
Mandel worked extensively as a scenic and costume designer for stage, film, musical theatres, city festivals, Music-Halls (was one of the founders), circus shows and other reforming arts venues in Moscow, Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) and Kiev, Ukraine.
He designed costumes for such famous actors as Arkadii Raikin, Leonid Utyosov, Klavdia Shulzhenko, Eddy Pozner.
During the long stretch of his 50-year creative career, Semyon Mandel designed 39 films (scenery and costumes) and more than 250 theatre productions and musicals.
Georgy Tovstonogov once wrote about Mandel in Russian: “His fantasy was enormous and highly imaginative and his creative mind knew no borders.
The most noted stage productions were created for the newly emerged Leningrad Music-Hall –“The skylarks” ( Nebesnue Lastochki) in 1934 and “Poputnui Veter” in 1937.
During the Second World War of 1940–1945, the artist joined the military and worked at the Army Front Headquarters newspaper making antiwar propaganda posters and leaflets in Leningrad and Moscow.
During that time, he also designed scenery and costumes for five movies; the most noted of them was “Svad’ba”, “Musical story” and “Anton Ivanovich Serditsja” – all of which went into the golden collection of Russian cinema fund.
In 1990, Alisa moved from Russia to the United States, where she lives in Washington, D.C. and designs costumes for theatre and dance, continuing her father’s footsteps.
In 1952, he became the resident designer of the “Leningrad Thearte Lencom”; in parallel he worked with Arkadyi Raikin, with whom he created 3 programs for “Theatre of Miniatures”.
Designing for Music Hall became the creative breeding ground for the artist, where he was able to utilize his rich fantasy in creating special effects in lighting, in moving and transforming scenery and costumes.