Other magazine artwork

Cover for the magazine Pionýr, 1957.

Magazine artwork for Vlastimil Toman´s short story To (It, magazine Pionýr, 1964).

Illustration celebrating the first Lunar landing of the Luna 2 probe.

Magazine artwork for H. G. Wells´s short story In the Abyss (Sestup do propasti) from 1976.

Friends from the Ophiuchus illustrations

Interior bw gouache illustrations for the magazine edition of the Vladimír Babula´s novel Přátelé z Hadonoše (Friends from the Ophiuchus, 1956) belong among the most striking Burian´s sf artworks. The novel is a third part of a space adventure trilogy with strong elements of the communist propaganda. It had been reprinted in a book form but not with Burian´s illustrations.

The Man from the First Century

Muž z prvního století (The Man from the First Century, 1962, directed by Oldřich Lipský) is the first Czechoslovak SF movie set completely in the future. The story itself is a social satire showing a contemporary guy who accidentaly undergoes a space travel by the first interstellar spaceship. Because of the relativistic effects he returns after 500 years, together with a friendly invisible alien whom he met in space. The society lives in utopian harmony and has all the typical features of the communist paradise, although the communism is not mentioned. Contrast of this "man from the first centrury after sputnik" and the idealised people who are funny as well brings a variety of comical situations. The movie is especially interesting for its totally futuristic design made by movie architect Jan Zázvorka.

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.