Futurism

Back in Italy, the writer Filippo Tommaso Marinetti published the Futurist Manifesto on the front page of the Paris newspaper Le Figaro on the 20th of February in 1909. Marinetti wanted to indicate that this would not only be a provincial Italian development, but to be a worldwide importance. Futurism rejected the harmony & order and expressed speed & movement. It was extremely influenced by technology and dynamic aspects of modern life.

The manifesto included an eleven-point programme stated below:

We intend to sing the love of danger, the habit of energy and fearlessness.

Courage, audacity, and revolt will be essential elements of our poetry.

Up to now literature has exalted a pensive immobility, ecstasy, and sleep. We intend to exalt aggresive action, a feverish insomnia, the racer’s stride, the mortal leap, the punch and the slap.

We affirm that the world’s magnificence has been enriched by a new beauty: the beauty of speed. A racing car whose hood is adorned with great pipes, like serpents of explosive breath—a roaring car that seems to ride on grapeshot is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.

We want to hymn the man at the wheel, who hurls the lance of his spirit across the Earth, along the circle of its orbit.

The poet must spend himself with ardor, splendor, and generosity, to swell the enthusiastic fervor of the primordial elements.

Except in struggle, there is no more beauty. No work without an aggressive character can be a masterpiece. Poetry must be conceived as a violent attack on unknown forces, to reduce and prostrate them before man.

We stand on the last promontory of the centuries!... Why should we look back, when what we want is to break down the mysterious doors of the Impossible? Time and Space died yesterday. We already live in the absolute, because we have created eternal, omnipresent speed.

We will glorify war—the world’s only hygiene—militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of freedom-bringers, beautiful ideas worth dying for, and scorn for woman.

We will destroy the museums, libraries, academies of every kind, will fight moralism, feminism, every opportunistic or utilitarian cowardice.

We will sing of great crowds excited by work, by pleasure, and by riot; we will sing of the multicolored, polyphonic tides of revolution in the modern capitals; we will sing of the vibrant nightly fervor of arsenals and shipyards blazing with violent electric moons; greedy railway stations that devour smoke-plumed serpents; factories hung on clouds by the crooked lines of their smoke; bridges that stride the rivers like giant gymnasts, flashing in the sun with a glitter of knives; adventurous steamers that sniff the horizon; deep-chested locomotives whose wheels paw the tracks like the hooves of enormous steel horses bridled by tubing; and the sleek flight of planes whose propellers chatter in the wind like banners and seem to cheer like an enthusiastic crowd.

Other futurists whom Marinetti collaborated with included Umberto Boccioni, Gino Severini, Carlo Carra and Giacomo Balla.

Umberto Boccioni's famous work of art the 'Unique Forms Of Continuity Space' is a bronze sculpture that shows an expression of movement and fluidity. This sculpture is also depicted on the Italian-issue 20 cent Euro coin. Boccioni trained himself as a painter and began sculpting in 1912, he also exclaimed that "these days I am obsessed by sculpture! I believe I have glimpsed a complete renovation of that mummified art." The following year Boccioni completed the sculpture shown above and his aim was to depict a 'synthetic continuity' of motion instead of an 'analytical discontinuity'.

The above image shows the front cover of a book that features over 200 sculptures of Art Nouveau. On this cover there is the sculpture by Francois Raoul Larche that goes back to Art Nouveau but also has a sense of futurism due to its movement.

The above image shows a poster of the movie Black Swan where it includes the geometric forms that shows how futurism is used nowadays.

References:
Benjamin Macklowe, 2013. Sculpture of Art Nouveau Paris. [image online] Available at: http://www.macklowegallery.com/education.asp/art+nouveau/Books+%26amp%3B+Articles/antiques/Art+Nouveau+Books/education/Dynamic+Beauty/id/284 [Accessed 20th November 2013]

R. Carson, 2010. Black Swan movie poster. [image online] Available at: http://myfantasyart.com/page/116/?cat=-1 [Accessed 20th November 2013]

maridia3, 2012. Unique Forms Of Continuity In Space. [online] Available at: http://aainter3.wordpress.com/2012/11/01/unique-forms-of-continuity-in-space/ [Accessed 18th November 2013]

Unknown, n.d. The Futurist Manifesto. [online] Available at: http://www.391.org/manifestos/19090220marinetti.htm [Accessed 18th November 2013]

Eurocoins, n.d. Images - 20 Euro Cents. [image online] Available at: http://www.eurocoins.co.uk/images20cents.html [Accessed 18th November 2013]

Dempsy, A. 2002. Styles, Schools And Movements. London; Thames & Hudson Ltd.