Futurism Art Movement/Style (The machine age)
What is Futurism
Futurism
can be defined as a 20th century style art movement that was formed based on
the focus to express the power, speed and values of the machine age (www.dictionary.com). The art style was originally started
by a group of Italian men including the non-other, well know Italian
poet and editor Filippo Tommaso Marinetti who was the ring leader of the foundation.
On February 20,1909 the first official announcement of this new art style was
made. Marinetti, being the one to compile up the first descriptive manifesto
for himself and he’s artistic group’s Futurism movement, it was soon spread to
many. It first appeared on the front page of Le Figaro, which at the time was
the largest newspaper that had the biggest circulation in France and with that publicity
stunt showed the movements ideology, desire and motives of employing this art
style to the new and changing modern world was clearly explained to the
public (www.theartstory-futurism-html). While the first manifesto basically
summed up the main principles of Futurism, the rest of the group would make it
a point to issue more manifestos that mentioned other Futurism elements over
the years that would come.
Futurism
Filippo
Tommaso Marinetti (centre), the founder of the Futurist movement, with the
artists (left to right) Luigi Russolo, Carlo Carrà, Umberto Boccioni, and Gino
Severini.Hulton.
Archive/Getty Images
Filippo
Marinetti alongside he's main Futurism artists at the time included Lugi Russolo,
Carlo Carra, Umberto Boccino, and Gino Severini. They all had a very
enthusiastic passion for new inventions such as cars, planes and industrial towns
because this according to them resembled a major triumph of man over nature.
These artists showed pride and embraced this new artistic style in the new modern world at the time and expressed it through their skills using art media and
mediums such as poetry, sculpture, theatre, music, painting and even went as further
up to gastronomy (the study of the relationship between food and culture) to show they're passion for change and industrialisation (James -Whtie,2018: no.p).
Futurists unlike cubists who
favoured still life and portraiture, futurists rather favoured representations
of things that had elements of power, speed and noise such as speeding
automobiles, trains, dancers, racing cyclists, animals and urban crowds. They’re
artworks always consisted of brighter and more vibrant colours and dynamic, rhythmically
swirling forms and violent movements. These were achieved by adopting the cubism
technique of using fragmented and intersecting plane surfaces and outlines to
show simultaneous views of an object, this effect ultimately resembled a
portray equivalent to a multiple photographic exposure of a moving object (James -Whtie,2018: no. p). eg.
Above is an example of an
image showing multiple photographic exposure of a moving object taken in the
1960s, by a famous English photographer called David Redfern who got his start taking camera shots for legends like Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk in London’s jazz clubs,
with pioneering colour photos that upended the genre’s traditional
black-and-white, film-nourish aesthetic. His luminous action shots style, were
mostly photographs that captured the diversity of the disco movement, as young
people of different races dance with mirrored dance floors, loud music, multi-coloured
lights and disco balls overhead (Benstein, 2018: no. p).
Futurism characteristics
·
Futurism developed to glorify the
urban life as well as machinery/industrialization
·
Rhythmic spatial repletion of an object
· Rejecting the art of the past and
celebrating change, originality, and innovation as part of society and culture.
·
Futurism employs techniques of
Divisionism
·
Promoted experiences of warfare
and reckless speed
·
Rejected everything feminism,
safety and dull
· The Futurists defined themselves as
anti-romantic
Other examples of Futurism artworks
Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, oil on canvas by Giacomo Balla, 1912; in the
Buffalo Fine Arts Academy, New York.
Futurism Art Movement - Umberto Boccioni
'Elasticity' 1912
'Elasticity' 1912
Futurism Art Movement - Umberto Boccioni
'The Street Enters the House' 1911
'The Street Enters the House' 1911
Contrast between old and modern artworks
Umberto
Boccioni, Unique Forms of
Continuity in Space, 1913, Bronze
This artwork was
created by Umberto Boccioni who was part of the establishment of the futuristic
movement as well as writer of some of the manifestos. Boccioni was a painter
and sculpture, he created this sculpture out of bronze to most likely represent
the metal of machinery age(industrialisation). The sculpture was done in the Futurism art style and
is presented in the form of an-aimless nude male in a powerful stride, the weird
contours of the muscular body flutter into the surrounding space to resemble
speed, expressing the figure’s great velocity and vitality as it rushes forward
in its environment which resembles the brave new Futurist ideology world, that modernisation is happening at a fast pace.
Modern Futurist
artwork
This
artwork was done by an artist known by the name Irina QQQ. She is an artist
that specialises mostly in vector/ illustrated artwork but also does digital graphics
and painting. Some of her work was shown in the 2014 exhibition at the Guggenheim
in New York City that was specifically themed to the influential Futuristic art
style named the “Italian Futurism of 1909-1944: Reconstructing the Universe”
alongside 5 other major modern Futurists artists. The artwork is an abstract
painting that features fractal vintage colourful blurred background that
resembles speed/motion. The foreground features wavy, blurred, striking strokes
and outlines of paint coloured in different vibrant colours resembling the
rejection of dullness. Colours that were used are: green, yellow, orange, red
and brown, chaotic blots and seamless patterns. Although the artwork did not
feature any structured subjects such as a car or human figure or any other object with elements of
power, speed and noise, the artist did however find other means to display
these elements within the painting using striking noisy brush outlines, bold
and thin strokes different colour paint, and blurriness effect to convey the Futuristic
art style of Chaos (Comstock, 2014: no. p).
Reference List
L, Comstock
(2014). Shutterstock Inc.
J, James-White
(2018). Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc.
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