Futurism

Futurism was an art movement launched by the Italian poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti in 1909. Futurism started when a small group of radical Italian artists began working just before the outbreak of the First World War.

Among modernist movements, the Futurists focused towards a new and modern Italy. This was partly because the weight of past culture in Italy was felt uninspiring. The three artists which were known for their Futurism Movement were Giacomo Balla, Umberto Boccioni and Gino Severini. They were influenced by using speed, machinery and war as subject matter.

Giacomo Balla was born 1871 and died in Rome 1958.  He was an Italian Futurist painter, sculptor and designer. He was a largely self-taught artist and his early works were portraits, landscapes and caricatures, and then he became increasingly interested in painting aspects of modern industrialised life. He went on to teach both Severini and Boccioni, which is why I also chose to talk about their work. Balla rapidly became one of the most original and inventive painters of the Futurist movement.

 

Secondly, Umberto Boccioni was born in 1882 and died 1916. He was an Italian Futurist painter, sculptor and etcher. By 1907, Boccioni wished to paint a modern industrial society, and was well known for his Futurist paintings around 1910, as well as adopting some Cubist techniques in his paintings. He also began to make sculptures, and by 1912 he issued a Technical Manifesto of Futurist Sculpture, and by 1914 his paintings had become distinctly Cubist and relatively static.

 

Finally, Gino Severini (1883-1966) was an Italian painter, designer and writer in art. In 1900 he met Boccioni and decided to become a painter; introduced by Boccioni to Balla, who initiated him in the Divisionism style. Along with Balla and Boccioni, Severini signed the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting in 1910, and for the next five years they became an active part of the Futurist movement.