About Paintings

The lyrics of the song were written by the well-known Russian poet Alexander Kushner, and the music was composed by Grigory Gladkov, who also performs it in the film.

The animation itself began almost by chance. While in Koktebel, the young animation directors Alexander Tatarsky and Igor Kovalyov heard Gladkov singing the song with a guitar and were immediately taken with it. At the time they had just founded a small animation studio in Kyiv, working with an improvised animation stand built from an X-ray machine mounted on a bed. The idea soon arose to turn the song into a short animated film — the beginning of a creative collaboration.

The song was recorded in a communal apartment in Leningrad. Gladkov accompanied himself on a twelve-string guitar and invited a flutist and a cellist, forming a small, informal ensemble.