The article analyzes how the change of visual codes in the Russian culture of the 1910–1920s is perceived in the works of formalists. Within this framework such things are regarded as the technique of ‘estrangement’ by V. Shklovsky, the problem of visual image and word correspondence, the interaction of literature and cinematography in the works by Yu. Tynyanov, V. Shklovsky, B. Eichenbaum.