Andrei Tarkovsky About His Film Art in His Own Words
Subtitle: CONVERSATIONS AND DISCUSSIONS in COLLEGE GLIENICKE, BERLIN
Contributors: editor
Edition: 1st edition
Publisher: Frost Publishing
Published: December 2008 / January 2009
Place of publication: Petersburg, VA
Language: eng
Number of pages: 165
ISBN-13: 9780971498280
Subjects: film art
Genres: film
First sentence: "From About Art--

...The man should bot be a slave of his knowledge about this world and should not impose his rules on this world...."


"From Basics of Film Aesthetics--

....The movie represents your point of view on the reality, and this point of view should not be changed during the whole film, otherwise you destroy your movie.

   For example, if you start to assemble the pieces of one scene, and you have one short piece in a different light, it does not work: it will not fit into the movie; it would destroy the scene...

The angle in which the camera casts creates a subjective space. If you change the angle of the camera position, you change this subjective space.....

Some people think that the photographic medium - film can truly reproduce nature. "just let us photograph the forest and the camera will true nature." This is wrong. Like an actor, nature can be true or false...

There are some trees which cannot be filmed. I don't know why it does not work.."


"From About Disaster and Stalker--

 We are worse than kids playing with matches. We reached such a low spiritual level, that if an atomic disaster had happened, it would just mean we deserved it.

  It means we have to struggle to achieve the spiritual affirmation of our existence. Do not just characterize "life is good" and "death is not good."

   People always died and will die; everybody will be confronted with death sooner or later. What's the difference, if a total disaster happens and everybody dies; so W H A T?!

  Maybe it would somehow be more fun to die all together instead of all alone. The question is: why are we so afraid?...


If we pose the question like this, we will find that we are not afraid because we discovered the possibility of death, but because we feel a spiritual emptiness which we perceive as the danger leading to the disaster...."
Description: During seven days in March 1984, Andrei Tarkovsky laid out, day by day his film theory, his philosophy, opinions and principles. It was the first time that Tarkovsky had to talk about his philosophy and film theory over such long time period.<p>

The book is illustrated with the drawings created in March 1984 by Andrei Tarkovsky and photographs.

The book contains conversations and discussions with internationally acclaimed Russian film director Andrei Tarkovsky published the first time. This workshop with Andrei Tarkovsky took place in Castle Glienicke, Berlin. For seven days in March of 1984, Tarkovsky presented his film theory, philosophy, opinions and principles day by day. It was the first time he had to talk about his philosophy and film art over such a long time period. In Fall of 1984 Tarkovsky published his book “Sculpting in Time” but many subjects of Glienicke’s conversation were not included in this book and will be made available to the public for the first time.

"Tarkovsky about His Film Art" is a valuable source of information for everybody who is interested to learn more about this great filmmaker’s own thoughts regarding his art and principles. The new book provides helpful information about Tarkovsky’s movies.

It is illustrated with Tarkovsky’s own drawings created in March 1984 and photographs.

There is a tendency to look for hidden symbols in Tarkovsky’s pictures. He denied hiding any symbolic meanings in his art and spent a lot of time explaining the difference between symbols and artistic pictures. He spoke about the basics of film aesthetics, the principals of visual and audio reception, about film as artwork and his “Trinity Theory” which was the complete opposite of Eisenstein’s theory. He stated that the artist and art-viewer are “two equal powers with different functions” and the third spiritual power appears during the artwork reception.

He was direct and outspoken with his opinions during the conversations in Castle Glienicke. For example, when he was asked why he doesn’t like the music of Tchaikovsky, he responded, “Imagine a big beautiful birthday cake. The cake is so delicious, but they insist that you have to eat the whole cake at once! The music of Tchaikovsky is like this!”

In March 1984, two years before the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl, Tarkovsky stated, “We are worse than kids playing with matches. We reached such a low spiritual level, that if a nuclear disaster had happened, it would just mean we deserved it. It means we have to struggle to achieve the spiritual affirmation of our existence. Do not just characterize “life is good” and “death is not good”. People always died and will die; everybody will be confronted with death sooner or later. What’s the difference, if a total disaster happens and everybody dies; so What?!...If we pose the question like this, we will find that we are not afraid because we discovered the possibility of death, but because we feel a spiritual emptiness which we perceive as the danger leading to disaster…” (from “About Disaster and Stalker”, p.86)

Andrei Tarkovsky (1932 – 1986) is listed among the 100 most critically acclaimed film directors; director Ingmar Bergman was quoted as saying "Tarkovsky for me is the greatest; the one who invented a new language, true to the nature of film, as it captures life as a reflection, life as a dream". Tarkovsky attained critical praise for films such as "Andrei Rublev", "Mirror", "Solaris", "Stalker", "Nostalghia" and "Sacrifice". --(from the Press)
Table of contents: class: section
title: Tarkovsky in Berlin, by Vadim Moroz; class: section
title: Introduction. How Tarkovsky Came to Berlin. Tarkovsky's Main Problem; as Lecturer; about Chekhov. Friedrich Gorenstein. About Renaissance. Tarkovsky and Berlin's Officials. Hoffmanniana. The Question of Commercial Success of Artistic Films.; class: section
title: Andrei Tarkovsky in His Own Words (March 1984); class: section
title: About Eisenstein and "Trinity Theory"; "Ivan's Childhood"; "Andrei Rublev". Tarkovsky about His Films, Nature, Film-Makers and Viewers. Film, Music and Pavlov's Dog. About Spielberg and Hollywood. Music in Film. Art and Creation. Stalker. Disaster and Stalker. The Grave Sin. About Art; Actors. The Basics of Film Aesthetics. Nostalghia. Tarkovsky's Aesthetics; class: section
title: A Few Aspects of Tarkovsky's Art, by V. Moroz; class: section
title: Artistic Image ("Icon", "Obras"). Composition as Element of Film Aesthetics. Time as Medium for the Artist. Development of Tarkovsky's Concept of "Memory"; class: section
title: Appendix: Catalog of Drawings by Andrei Tarkovsky created during the Conversations in Castle Glienicke, Berlin, Germany, March 1984