Art of Nikolay Kolchitsky

The Moon of Saturn. Illustration for the book Travel to Space (Puteshestvye v kosmos, 1958) by M. Vasilyev.

First on Mars. Illustration for the book Travel to Distant Worlds (Puteshestvye k Dalyokim Miram, 1960) by K. Giltsin.

The Road to the Moon is Ready. Illustration for the Tekhnika Molodezhi magazine, 1956.

Earth - Mars (Zemlya - Mars). Illustration for the article in the Yuni Tekhnik magazine, 1956.

The most important Soviet space artist of the 1950´s and 1960´s was probably Nikolay Kolchitsky (1907 - 1979), a collaborator of the Tekhnika Molodezhi magazine and illustrator of many books and magazine features on exploring outer space. The artist had technical education so he was quite easy with portraying technology of the future. His artwork shows the cold beauty of other worlds and space technology; the artist tried to be most precise and serious.

The artwork had been sent by Yuri Zubakin. See his entire collection of Kolchitsky´s art here.

A charming poster for the Soviet movie Volání dálných světů (Nebo zovyot, The Heavens Call) by Czech artist Dobroslav Foll, 1959.

Poster for the Soviet movie Byl jsem družicí slunce (Ya byl sputnikom soltsa, I Was a Sputnik of the Sun) by an important artist-illustrator Adolf Born (collaboration Oldřich Jelínek), 1959.

Posters for the movie Ikarie XB-1 (aka Voyage to the End of the Universe). Above is Polish poster by Maria Siska from 1964, below an original Czech poster by Teodor Rotrekl from 1963. The artist probably had to finish the poster before he could see the movie (which was usual practice at that time), the spaceship totaly differs from the model used in the film.