Futurism. Italian avant-garde art movement, launched in 1909, that exalted the dynamism of the modern world; it was literary in origin, but most of its major exponents were painters, and it also embraced sculpture, architecture, music, the cinema, and photography. The First World War brought the movement to an end as a vital force, but it lingered in Italy until the 1930s, and it had a strong influence in other countries, particularly Russia.

The founder of Futurism was Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, who launched the movement with a manifesto published in French in the Parisian newspaper Le Figaro on 20 February 1909. In bombastic, inflammatory language, he attacked established values (‘set fire to the library shelves … flood the museums') and called for the cultural rejuvenation of Italy by means of a new art that would celebrate technology, speed, and all things modern. Many Italians shared Marinetti's dismay that—following the stirring days of unification in the mid-19th century—their country had failed to become a truly modern nation, and few, if any, of the ideas expressed in the manifesto are original: they emerge from ‘a tangled web of turn-of-the-century political, cultural and philosophical currents’ ( Caroline Tisdall and Angelo Bozzolla, Futurism, 1977). What was new was the exaggerated violence of the language and the skill with which the document was publicized. Marinetti was a brilliant manipulator of the media, and it is typical of his panache that he had his manifesto published not in some obscure journal, but on the front page of one of the most prestigious newspapers in the world (he was very wealthy and simply hired the space). Futurism was also novel as a movement in that it chose its own name and that it started with an idea and only gradually found a way of expressing it in artistic form.

In spite of Marinetti's repeated use of ‘we’ in the manifesto, there was no Futurist group when it was published. However, he soon attracted adherents among other Italians, notably a group of painters based in Milan, whom he helped to produce the Manifesto of Futurist Painters, published as a leaflet by his magazine Poesia in February 1910. It was drawn up by Boccioni, Carrà, and Russolo, and also signed by Balla (who lived in Rome) and Severini (who was in Paris at this time). The same five signed the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting, published in April 1910. Whereas the first painters' manifesto is little more than a repetition of Marinetti's bombast, the Technical Manifesto does suggest—although in vague terms—the course that Futurist painting would take, with the emphasis on conveying movement (or the experience of movement): ‘The gesture which we would reproduce on canvas shall no longer be a fixed moment in universal dynamism. It shall simply be the dynamic sensation itself.’

In trying to work out a visual idiom to express such concerns, the Futurist painters at first were strongly influenced by Divisionism, in which forms are broken down into small patches of colour—suitable for suggesting sparkling effects of light or the blurring caused by high-speed movement, as in Boccioni's The City Rises (MOMA, New York, 1910–11). In 1911, however, Boccioni and Carrà visited Marinetti and Severini in Paris, where they were influenced by Cubism. Thereafter they began using fragmented forms and multiple viewpoints, with the sense of movement often accentuated by vigorous diagonals. Balla developed a different approach to suggesting motion, imitating the effects of multiple-exposure photography in which successive images taken a fraction of a second apart overlap and blur (such photographs had first been taken by Étienne-Jules Marey in the 1880s). The subjects of the Futurist painters were typically drawn from urban life, and they were often political in intent.

Futurist paintings were first publicly shown at a mixed exhibition in Milan in 1911, but the first proper group exhibition was held in February 1912 at the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune in Paris. Subsequently it travelled to London (the Sackville Gallery), Berlin (the Sturm Gallery, where many of the exhibits were bought by a private collector), Amsterdam, Zurich, Vienna, and Budapest. Marinetti's skilful promotion techniques (backed by his personal fortune) ensured that the exhibition gained a great deal of publicity; reactions to it were very mixed, but the Futurists were never ignored. The preface to the catalogue, signed by Balla (who did not exhibit), Boccioni, Carrà, Russolo, and Severini, was in effect an updated manifesto, in which they discussed a vague principle of ‘force-lines', through which objects fuse with their surroundings. Their ideas are summarized by George Heard Hamilton as follows: ‘According to this document they wanted to portray the sum of visual and psychological sensations as a “synthesis of what one remembers and of what one sees”. In addition to the visible surface of objects, there are the dynamic sensations conveyed by the invisible extensions of their “force-lines”, which reveal how the object “would resolve itself were it to follow the tendencies of its forces”. Since the work of art, through this process of “physical transcendentalism”, can be considered the representation of a state of mind, and the force-lines, as perspective elements, tend towards infinity, the spectator is placed “in the centre of the picture”.’

Boccioni (the only major sculptor in the group) expressed similar ideas about the relationship of form, motion, and environment in his Manifesto of Futurist Sculpture, published in April 1912. There was also a Manifesto of Futurist Architecture—by Antonio Sant'Elia (1888–1916), whose powerful and audacious designs remained on paper—as well as musical manifestos (see RUSSOLO), and several on other topics, including a Manifesto of Futurist Lust (1913) by the French writer, dancer and painter Valentine de Saint-Point (1875–1953). She thought that lust was an essential part of life's dynamism: ‘It is the sensory and sensual synthesis that leads to the greatest liberation of the spirit. It is a communion of a particle of humanity with all the sensuality of the earth.’ The Futurists spread their ideas also through meetings—in various public venues—that were sometimes like a cross between political rally and variety theatre, anticipating Performance art.

In keeping with this talent for self-promotion, the Futurists had widespread influence in the period immediately before and during the First World War. Stylistically, the influence is clear in the work of the Vorticists in England, for example, and that of Marcel Duchamp in France and Joseph Stella in the USA, whilst the use of provocative manifestos and other shock tactics was most eagerly adopted by the Dadaists. Outside Italy, however, it was in Russia that Futurism made the greatest impact, although there were significant differences between the movements in the two countries: Russian Futurism was expressed as much in literature and the theatre as in the visual arts, and it combined modern ideas with an interest in primitivism. The Union of Youth, founded in 1910, was an important nurturing ground for Futurism, but its starting-point as a movement in Russia is often reckoned to be the manifesto A Slap in the Face for Public Taste (1912), the signatories of which included David Burliuk and Vladimir Mayakovsky. The Russian Futurists rejected Symbolism, which had been such a powerful force in the country's art, demanding a new and experimental attitude, and they welcomed the Revolution. In terms of Russian painting, Futurism was particularly influential on Rayonism (see also CUBO-FUTURISM).

Russian Futurism flourished into the 1920s, but Italian Futurism—as an organized movement—was virtually ended by the First World War (during which Boccioni, its outstanding artist, and also Sant’ Elia died; ironically, Marinetti had welcomed the war as a means of cleansing the world). Of the leading painters of the pre-war phase, only Balla remained true to Futurism, and its centre of activity moved from Milan to Rome, where he lived. Carrà changed course completely during the war, joining de Chirico in Metaphysical Painting. After the war, Marinetti continued with his literary and political activities, supporting Fascism (he was a friend of Mussolini). Fascism and Futurism shared an aggressive nationalism and the names are often linked; Futurism has even been described as ‘the official art of Fascism'. This, however, is untrue. Although Fascism was ideologically close to Nazism, it was much more tolerant and open in artistic matters; there was no official art of the regime, but in the 1930s the pompous style favoured by some Novecento artists came much closer to this than Futurism ever did (see TOTALITARIAN ART). By this time all the life had gone out of Futurism, and Marinetti's attempt to revive it as Aeropittura was a mere footnote to the movement.

One of the best collections of Futurist art outside Italy is the Eric and Salome Estorick Foundation, London, which opened to the public in 1998. The collection was made by the American-born art dealer Eric Estorick (1913–93) and his wife Salome (1920–89).

Futurism. Italian avant-garde art movement, launched in 1909, that exalted the dynamism of the modern world; it was literary in origin, but most of its major exponents were painters, and it also embraced sculpture, architecture, music, the cinema, and photography. The First World War brought the movement to an end as a vital force, but it lingered in Italy until the 1930s, and it had a strong influence in other countries, particularly Russia.

The founder of Futurism was the writer Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, who launched the movement with a manifesto published in French in the Parisian newspaper Le Figaro on 20 February 1909. In bombastic, inflammatory language, he attacked established values (‘set fire to the library shelves…flood the museums’) and called for the cultural rejuvenation of Italy by means of a new art that would celebrate technology, speed, and all things modern. Although he repeatedly used the word ‘we’ in the manifesto, there was no Futurist group when it was published (the movement was unusual not only in choosing its own name but also in that it started with an idea and only gradually found a way of expressing it in artistic form). However, he soon attracted adherents among other Italians, notably a group of painters based in Milan, whom he helped to produce the Manifesto of Futurist Painters, published in February 1910. It was drawn up by Boccioni, Carrà, and Russolo, and also signed by Balla (who lived in Rome) and Severini (who was in Paris at this time). The same five (the main painters of the movement) signed the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting, published in April 1910. Whereas the first painters' manifesto is little more than a repetition of Marinetti's bombast, the Technical Manifesto does suggest—although in vague terms—the course that Futurist painting would take, with the emphasis on conveying movement (or the experience of movement). In trying to work out a visual idiom to express such concerns, the Futurist painters at first were strongly influenced by divisionism, in which forms are broken down into small patches of colour—suitable for suggesting sparkling effects of light or the blurring caused by high-speed movement. From 1911, however, some of them—influenced by Cubism—began using fragmented forms and multiple viewpoints, often accentuating the sense of movement by vigorous diagonals. Their subjects were typically drawn from urban life, and they were often political in intent, but at times their work came close to abstraction.

Boccioni (the only major sculptor in the group) showed a similar concern with movement in his Manifesto of Futurist Sculpture, published in April 1912. There was also a Manifesto of Futurist Architecture (1914)—by Antonio Sant'Elia (1888–1916), whose powerful and audacious designs remained on paper—as well as musical manifestos (see Russolo), and several on other topics, including a Manifesto of Futurist Lust (1913). Marinetti had a prodigious talent for publicity (backed by substantial inherited wealth) and Futurism was promoted not only through such manifestos, but also by exhibitions, lectures, press conferences, and various attention-seeking stunts, some of which foreshadowed Performance art.

In keeping with this talent for self-promotion, the Futurists had widespread influence in the period immediately before and during the First World War. Stylistically, the influence is clear in the work of the Vorticists and Nevinson in England, for example, and that of Marcel Duchamp in France and Joseph Stella in the USA, whilst the use of provocative manifestos and other shock tactics was most eagerly adopted by the Dadaists. Outside Italy, however, it was in Russia that Futurism made the greatest impact, although there were significant differences between the movements in the two countries: Russian Futurism was expressed as much in literature and the theatre as in the visual arts, and it combined modern ideas with an interest in primitivism. In terms of Russian painting, Futurism was particularly influential on Rayonism.

Russian Futurism flourished into the 1920s, but Italian Futurism—as an organized movement—was virtually ended by the First World War (during which Boccioni, its outstanding artist, and also Sant'Elia died; ironically, Marinetti had welcomed the war as a means of cleansing the world). Of the leading painters of the pre-war phase, only Balla remained true to Futurism, and its centre of activity moved from Milan to Rome, where he lived. After the war, Marinetti continued with his literary and political activities, supporting Fascism (he was a friend of Mussolini). Fascism and Futurism shared an aggressive nationalism and the names are often linked; Futurism has even been described as ‘the official art of Fascism’. This, however, is untrue. Although Fascism was ideologically close to Nazism, it was much more tolerant and open in artistic matters; there was no official art of the regime, but in the 1930s the pompous style favoured by some novecento artists came much closer to this than Futurism ever did.

FUTURISM

A term coined by the Italian poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876–1944), Futurism emphasized discarding the static and irrelevant art of the past. It celebrated change, originality, and innovation in culture and society and glorified the new technology of the twentieth century, with emphasis on dynamism, speed, energy, and power. Russian Futurism, founded by Velimir Khlebnikov (1885–1922), a poet and a mystic, and Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893–1930), the leading poet of Russian Revolution of 1917 and of the early Soviet period, went beyond its Italian model with a focus on a revolutionary social and political outlook. In 1912 the Russian Futurists issued the manifesto "A Slap in the Face of Public Taste" that advocated the ideas of Italian futurism and attacked Alexander Pushkin, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and Leo Tolstoy. With the Revolution of 1917, the Russian Futurists attempted to dominate postrevolutionary culture in hopes of creating a new art integrating all aspects of daily life within a vision of total world transformation; artists would respond to a call to transcend and remake reality through a revolutionized aesthetic, to break down the barriers that had heretofore alienated the old art and the old reality. Russian Futurism argued that art, by eliciting predetermined emotions, could organize the will of the masses for action toward desired goals. In 1923 Mayakovsky cofounded with Osip Brik the Dadaistic journal LEF. Soviet avant-garde architects led by Nikolai Ladovsky were also highly influenced by Futurism and the theory that humanity's "world understanding" becomes a driving force determining human action only when it is fused with world-perception, defined as "the sum of man's emotional values … created by sympathy or revulsion, friendship or animosity, joy or sorrow, fear or courage." Only by sensing the world through the "feeling of matter" could one understand, and thus be driven to change, the world. The Futurists were initially favored by Anatoly Lunacharsky, the Soviet commissar of education, and obtained important cultural posts. But by 1930 they had lost influence within the government and within most of the literary community.

See also: lunacharsky, anatoly vasilievich; mayakovsky, vladimir vladimirovich; october revolution

bibliography

Janecek, Gerald. (1996). Zaum: The Transrational Poetry of Russian Futurism. San Diego, CA: San Diego State University Press.

Markov, Vladimir. (1968). Russian Futurism: A History. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Hugh D. Hudson Jr.

Futurism (Futurismo). Italian avant-garde art movement, launched in 1909, that exalted the dynamism of the modern world; it was literary in origin, but most of its major exponents were painters, and it also embraced sculpture, architecture, music, the cinema, and photography. The First World War brought the movement to an end as a vital force, but it lingered in Italy until the 1930s, and it had a strong influence in other countries. The founder and chief theorist of Futurism was the Italian writer Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876–1944), and the main painters involved were Balla, Boccioni, Carrà, Russolo, and Severini. The aim of the movement, which was outlined in various manifestos, was to break with the past and its academic culture and to celebrate modern technology, dynamism, and power. In trying to work out a visual idiom to express such concerns, the Futurist painters at first were strongly influenced by Divisionism, in which forms are broken down into small patches of colour—suitable for suggesting sparkling effects of light or the blurring caused by high-speed movement. From 1911, however, some of them—influenced by Cubism—began using fragmented forms and multiple viewpoints, often accentuating the sense of movement by vigorous diagonals. The subjects of the Futurist painters were typically drawn from urban life, and they were often political in intent, but at times their work came close to abstraction. Marinetti had a prodigious talent for publicity (backed by substantial inherited wealth) and Futurism was promoted not only through exhibitions but also by lectures, press conferences, and various attention-seeking stunts, some of which foreshadowed Performance art. In keeping with this talent for self-promotion, the Futurists had widespread influence in the period immediately before and during the First World War. Stylistically, the influence is clear in Vorticism in England and Rayonism in Russia, for example, and in the work of Marcel Duchamp in France and Joseph Stella in the USA, whilst the use of provocative manifestos and other shock tactics was most eagerly adopted by the Dadaists.

futurism Italian school of painting, sculpture, and literature that flourished from 1909, when Filippo Tommaso Marinetti's first manifesto of futurism appeared, until the end of World War I. Carlo Carrà, Gino Severini, and Giacomo Balla were the leading painters and Umberto Boccioni the chief sculptor of the group. The architect Antonio Sant' Elia also belonged to this school. The futurists strove to portray the dynamic character of 20th-century life; their works glorified danger, war, and the machine age, attacked academies, museums, and other establishment bastions, and, in theory at least, favored the growth of fascism. The group had a major Paris exhibition in 1912 that showed the relationship of their work to cubism . Their approach to the rendering of movement by simultaneously representing several aspects of forms in motion influenced many painters, including Duchamp and Delaunay. Futurist principles and techniques strongly influenced Russian constructivism .

Bibliography: See studies by M. W. Martin (1968), J. Rye (1972), U. Apollino (1973), C. Tisdale and A. Bozollo (1985), and M. Perloff (1989).

Futurism. Italian architectural movement founded by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876–1944) in 1909. It exploited images derived from industrial buildings (dams, hydroelectric schemes, silos, etc), skyscrapers, multi-level highways, and factories with curved ends, and it glorified machines, speed, and violence leading to world war. The chief architectural exponents were Antonio Sant-'Elia (1888–1916) and Mario Chiattone (1891–1957), who produced visions of the metropolis of the future, with forms reminiscent of some of those designed by the Vienna Sezessionists and Mendelsohn. The movement became closely associated with Fascism, and many of its ideas were absorbed by the avant-garde, notably Russian Constructivism, Le Corbusier, Archigram, and many others.

Bibliography

R. Banham (1960);
Caramel & and Longatti (1988);
Hulten (1987);
Martin (1977);
E. D. C. Meyer (1995);
Jane Turner (1996);
Tisdall & and Bozzolla (1977)

Futurism, a 20th-cent. avant-garde movement in Italian art, literature, and music, promoted by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876–1944) and others. Its programme, outlined in the Futurist Manifesto (1909), was to break with the past and its academic culture and to celebrate technology, dynamism, and power. In language and in poetry it advocated the destruction of traditional syntax, metre, and punctuation in the name of the ‘free word’.

The movement petered out during the 1930s after Marinetti's incorporation into Fascist academic culture. The principal founder of Russian Futurism was Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893–1930): the Russian manifesto was published in 1912 but the movement found little favour with Lenin and the Communist authorities, and it also dwindled away, although Mayakovsky himself was later reinstated (posthumously) by Stalin.

futurism. Artistic movt. which began in 1909 when Marinetti published his futurist manifesto in a Paris newspaper. Aim was to emphasize dynamic force and motion in industrial soc. Musically this meant all kinds of noise, and special instr. were invented, such as exploders, thunderers, and whistlers. Prominent in the movt. were Francesco Pratella (1880–1955), who composed for a standard orch., and Luigi Russolo (1885–1947), a painter, who wanted every kind of sound to be mus. material. Two of his works, perf. London 1914, were The Awakening of a Great City and A Meeting of Motorcars and Aeroplanes. Movement petered out c.1918, but left its mark.

fu·tur·ism / ˈfyoōchəˌrizəm/ • n. concern with events and trends of the future or which anticipate the future. ∎  (Futurism) an artistic movement begun in Italy in 1909 that violently rejected traditional forms so as to celebrate and incorporate into art the energy and dynamism of modern technology. Launched by Filippo Marinetti, it had effectively ended by 1918 but was widely influential, particularly in Russia on figures such as Malevich and Mayakovsky.

Futurism, artistic movement which emerged in Italy during the first decade of the 20th century. Embracing painting, sculpture, poetry, and the theatre, its main concern was to introduce contemporary ingredients into art, and notably to reflect the dynamic impact of technology. During the 1920s its theories became identified with Fascism, though in many of its experiments with language, and in its breaking-up of action, it prefigured the Theatre of the Absurd. A number of futurist plays were performed at the Teatro degli Indipendenti.

futurism Art movement that originated in Italy (1909) with the publication of the first futurist manifesto. It aimed to glorify machines and to depict speed and motion by means of an adapted version of cubism. It was violently opposed to the study of art of the past and embraced the values of modernity. Leading futurists include the poet Marinetti. Its ideas were absorbed by the Dada movement and by surrealism.

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