Jul 13, 2017

Dresch (1928). This weekend I was rewatching Henri-Georges Clouzot’s superb thriller, Les Diaboliques (1954) after which I went searching for the equally superb posters by Raymond Gid (1905–2000). I hadn’t really looked at the rest of Gid’s work before so this post remedies the situation with a selection from some of the many examples available […]
Feb 17, 2016

An early promotional poster from 2014 by Jay Shaw. Ben Wheatley’s film of the novel by JG Ballard approaches. As is my custom, I’ve been avoiding the trailers of this and any other film of interest but the posters are increasingly impressive. Ben Wheatley and fellow Brit filmmaker Peter Strickland (whose The Duke of Burgundy […]
Oct 13, 2014

Polish poster (1965) by Jerzy Skarzynski who was also the film’s production designer. I love The Saragossa Manuscript, both the novel by Potocki and the movie by Has. I saw the film three times which, in my case, is absolutely exceptional. Luis Buñuel in My Last Sigh (1983) No surprise that a lifelong Surrealist was […]
Nov 6, 2013

W.E. (2011). Being someone who enjoys adopting and pastiching different art and design styles for different projects I naturally like to see other people doing the same. American illustrator and designer Akiko Stehrenberger is very adept at using this approach for her film posters. Without knowing the identity of the person responsible you wouldn’t guess […]
Aug 28, 2013

This picture of a séance in the 1920s circulates endlessly in the Tumblr labyrinth, usually without attribution so many of the people seeing it won’t be aware that it’s a still (or a set photo) from Fritz Lang’s Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler (1922). Mabuse himself originates in a novel of the same name by Norbert […]
Jul 24, 2010

A Secret Wish (1985). Design by the London Design Partnership. The dark Religions are departed & sweet Science reigns — William Blake It’s a hallmark of musical obsession when you find yourself buying the same album over and over. Propaganda’s meisterwerk from 1985, A Secret Wish, was finally released in a definitive double-CD version this […]
Jun 20, 2010

Peafile (2006) by Shawn Smith; plywood, ink, acrylic paint. • Surreal Friends, an exhibition of work by Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo and Kati Horna at the Pallant House Gallery, Chichester, UK. Related: The surrealist muses who roared, Leonora Carrington and other women Surrealists profiled. • Landscapes From a Dream: How the Art of David Pelham […]