El arte de Bollywood

"All ye devotees and followers of Shah Rukh Khan, if you think the book The Art of Bollywood is about your hero and Bollywood dancing, you are going to be sorely disappointed. On the other hand, if you think Bollywood is central to an understanding of India and the Indian psyche, then this coffee table book about how the Hindi film industry communicated with its viewers outside the theatre on the streets and thoroughfares of the Subcontinent since the 1930s, and in the process formulated a distinct image for itself, will be essential reading for you. And here's the best part. While the text itself is a mine of well-researched information about a subject that was mostly neglected until now, the authors, Rajesh Devraj with Edo Bouman in collaboration with the National Film Archive of India, have done an exceptional job and unearthed long-lost posters and hoardings, booklets and other publicity material. As a result, the book gives the reader a remarkably evocative and delightful walk down memory lane. ... The book will appeal not merely to scholars and theoreticians of cinema and Hindi film aficionados, but to a much larger international audience which is interested in the question 'How do you communicate the moving image through a static one?' ... Now for the very first time, the painters and artists who were responsible for spreading the gospel of Bollywood cinema get their due, and their work is studied in some depth. We owe a big thank you to TASCHEN and Devraj for conceiving and seeing this worthy project through. ... But The Art of Bollywood is also a history of the changing preoccupations of the country since cinema came to India in 1913. ... In short, the posters are a visual repository of popular culture. ... Go ahead, sit with this book on a lazy Sunday afternoon, dip into the text, and feast your eyes on the kitsch and art of this lost art-form."
The Open Magazine, New Delhi, India