Not everything has a story behind it. Some things become a part of your life inadvertently. Gallerist Meena Varma, who is exhibiting a collection of more than 60 rare films posters, lobby cards and stills (in a show titled, Historical Moments) at her recently opened gallery, Arts of the Earth, says that she developed interest in film posters because of her husband Siddhartha Tagore.
“Filmmaker Satyajit Ray was a friend of Siddhartha’s father. His mother was a part of the film critic board back then. So being associated with cinema, Siddhartha inherited few posters/ stills of the classics and eventually became interested in collecting them. And his interest rubbed off on me too,” says Meena, who owns more than 20,000 such posters collected over three decades.
She doesn’t remember any stories behind any of the posters as most of them were bought in bulk from dealers in Kolkata and Mumbai. “But yes, I remember the culture that was common when we were young. Unlike today, the single-screen cinema halls displayed variety of film stills in the lobbies. And I have many of those ‘lobby stills’ that are a story in themselves. These are nostalgic pieces and thus interest many cinema patrons,” she says.
And, then there are people who like studying the details. “We all know that Ray took interest in the designing of the film posters on his own. He was very particular about detailing. And many people want to own the posters to study the details and the art of those times,” says Meena, who plans to hold exhibition of film posters at least twice a year in her gallery. While she owns many rare posters of films like Ray’s Pather Panchali and Raj Kapoor’s Ab Dilli Door Nahi, she is still on a lookout for posters/stills from films like Sonar Kella.