Polish Film Posters

A post on Polish Posters is the sanest thing to do if your webpage is in need of some jazz. Look how mine shines. Anyway, the reason behind this is an accidental discovery of a folder containing images of posters designed by Eryk Lypinski, who alongwith Henryk Tomaszewski and others, revolutionised the art of film posters in a Poland ripped apart by WW II. A condensed history of what followed is here.

Prominent among the ones who came later and are now names, are Wiktor Sadowski and Wieslaw Walkuski.

Once you have figured how all the names are pronounced, check out a great collection of Polish film posters here.

Art by Film Directors

I picked this book off the footpaths of Flora Fountain and that too for less than what I pay to borrow two DVDs. I tried to articulate the experience of reading it in many ways only to be embarrass myself after knowing the amount of clichés in my jargon.

'Art by Film Directors' has been compiled / authored by Karl French, undoubtedly the least known name in the book. It features 23 filmmakers in the likes of Jan Swankmajer, Jean Cocteau, Peter Greenway, Alan Parker, Stanley Kubrick, Federico Fellni, Wim Wenders, Satyajit Ray, Fritz Lang and their artworks—Photographs, Paintings, Illustrations, Sculptures etc. Featured above is a ‘reimagined map’ and a ‘fused creature’, both by Swankmajer.

Instant Light

I am reading 'Sculpting in Time'. All of you thinking 'By who' can queue up at the back door, I'll meet you individually after I am done with telling this.

Apart from wanting to watch all his films chronologically, It has also prompted me to share with you something precious I stumbled upon long back while scouting the web. A set of polaroids taken by the master! They are from 'Instant Light', a book published by Thames and Hudson compiling most of the pictures. The Guardian has a review of the same accompanied by brief commentaries written by Tarkovsky's son.

Also this is a good site if you want to spend some good hour reading/viewing things related to Tarkovsky, instead of watching cricket.

And please say hello to my sister Reshmi, whom I thank hereby for gifting me the book last year.


"...An artistic discovery occurs each time as a new and unique image of the world, a hieroglyphic of absolute truth. It appears as a revelation, as a momentary, passionate wish to grasp intuitively and at a stroke all the laws of this world - its beauty and ugliness, its compassion and cruelty, its infinity and its limitations..."
Andrei Tarkovsky, Sculpting in Time.