If you’re a fan of Wes Anderson’s cinematographic worlds, you really need to go the Light House Cinema in Smithfield ASAP. There is something quite special awaiting you at the back of the cinema’s little café. There, inside two glass displays lay beautiful props from The Grand Budapest Hotel, Anderson’s latest release. You will find the already iconic Mendl’s pastry boxes, a bottle of champagne and Madame D.’s last will among other treasures.
They were born under the hand of Annie Atkins, who was the lead graphic designer on the film. She is Dublin-based and kindly loaned her own copies to the Light House cinema so Wes Anderson fans can marvel at the intricate details that brought the fictititious empire of Zubrowka to life. She was responsible for everything paper in the film (telegrams, correspondence, passports, maps, currency, books, labels, reports, etc) and created the very hotel signage that you can see on the film poster as well.
Under Wes Anderson’s precise supervision, she drew influences from Ernst Lubitsch’s films and 1930s Germany to shape up Grand Budapest’s pink world.
If you needed any more proof that Wes Anderson is a firm believer of ‘God is in the details’, The exhibition ‘A Brief Survey of Graphic Design from the Empire of Zubrowka (1932-1968)’ is for you. Nothing is left half-done, to the point where Wes Anderson wrote himself the articles in the fictitious newspaper The Trans-Alpine Yodel, knowing that no one would even read them. Well that is not totally true, is it? As you can do so now in the Light House Cinema.
Practical Information
Annie Atkins Exhibition, from the 7th to the 24th of March 2014 (edit 25/03/14: extended until 31 March)
Light House Cinema
Market Square
Dublin 7
http://www.lighthousecinema.ie/
Luas: Smithfield
Bus: 37, 39, 70, 83
Entrance: Free
Showtimes for The Grand Budapest Hotel at the Light House Cinema