Shelenkov, Aleksandr Vladimirovich

Born Dec. 13 (26), 1903, in the village of Zamesh’e, in what is now Smolensk Oblast. Soviet cameraman. Honored Art Worker of the RSFSR (1959).

Shelenkov graduated from the department of camera operation of the State Technicum of Cinematography in 1929. Until 1945 he was a cameraman for the Soiuzdetfil’m motion-picture studio, and after 1945 he worked for Mosfil’m. He worked with the cameraman I. E. Chen beginning in 1944.

Shelenkov’s films have included Dzhul’bars (1936), Salavat Maev (1941), Zoia (1944), Rainis (1949), Far From Moscow (1950), Admiral Ushakov (1953), The Ships Are Storming the Bastions (1953), Romeo and Juliet (1955), the joint Soviet-Bulgarian film A History Lesson (1957), The Communist (1958), the joint film of the USSR and the German Democratic Republic (GDR) Five Days, Five Nights (1961), and the joint Soviet-Polish film Jarosław Dqbrowski (1974–76). Shelenkov and Chen also shot a number of scenes for the film War and Peace (1966–67), including the battles of Schöngrabern and Austerlitz and the hunt.

Shelenkov was awarded the State Prize of the USSR in 1946, 1947, 1950, and 1951. He has been awarded two orders and several medals.