If someone, however, feels like turning their general fascination into a solid competence and broader interpretations, they ought to get hold of Adriana Prodeus's monograph Themersonowie. Szkice biograficzne (Themersons. Biographical Essay). It is an aptly written book, rich in facts and witty comments which constitutes a transparent reference position, not just about the mesmerizing art duo, but also the history of 20th century avant-garde in and outside of Poland. Prodeus not only studied everything signed by the Themersons and consulted all possible (and dispersed) publications that were devoted to them; she also tracked down the even more inaccessible sources, such as correspondence, national and international institutional archives, and private collections. The knowledge she thus gathered was transparently transformed into eight chapters, which, when listed together, represent the chronology as well the key constituents of the Themersons' oeuvre: Youth, Films, France, The War, London, Long Short Stories, Painting and Drawing, Voices.
What can we learn from them?
They met for the first time as children as a result of family connections; however, they didn't marry until the year of Franciszka's graduation from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. Their first collaborations as a married couple included children's literature and film. Titles which nowadays can be found in almost every bookshop in Poland – such as Poczta (Post Office), Narodziny liter (The Birth of Letters), Pan Tom buduje dom (Mr. Rouse Builds His House), Był gdzieś haj taki kraj – are reprints of books created in the 1930s; the elements of technological utopia, attempts to combine technology and art that can be found in them, derive from manifestos of the European avant-garde of the time, mainly futurists. Around the same time, the Themersons started experimenting with cinema – their film period lasted about fifteen years, during which they created seven films. With limited resources and usually working in their own bedrooms, having been inspired by the Western leaders in the field – such as Henri Chomette, Fernand Léger, René Clair, Luis Buñuel, and Dalí – they created groundbreaking pictures, which, according to film historians were artistically on the same level as works by the famous Parisians. Their film Przygoda człowieka poczciwego (The Adventure of a Good Citizen) from 1937 became an inspiration for Roman Polański's famous short film Dwaj ludzie z szafą (Two Men and a Wardrobe) as well as Start (Beginning) by Jerzy Skolimowski. It is also possible that it influenced the early pieces of Walerian Borowczyk and Jan Lenica.