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FUTURISM
UMBERTO BOCCIONI 1882 - 1916
The Italian painter and sculptor Umberto Boccioni was a leading theorist of the futurist movement in art.
The futurists attempted to show the dynamic quality of 20th-century life by glorifying violence and technology
in their work.
Boccioni was born on Oct. 19, 1882, in Reggio di Calabria, Italy. He was trained from 1898 to 1902 in the
studio of the painter Giacomo Balla, where
he learned to paint in the manner of the pointillists, who used points of pure color to compose pictures. He
settled in Milan in 1907 and gradually came under the influence of the poet Filippo Marinetti, who launched
the literary movement Futurism. Boccioni
adapted Marinetti's ideas to the visual arts and became the leading theoretician of futurist art. In 1910 he
and other painters drew up and published the “Technical Manifesto of the Futurist Painters,” promoting the
representation of the symbols of modern technology—violence, power, and speed.
Boccioni's first major futurist painting, "Riot in the Gallery" (1909), remained close to pointillism and
showed a connection with futurism mainly in its violent subject matter and dynamic composition. "The City
Rises" (1910–11), however, is an excellent example of futurist painting in its representation of dynamism,
motion, and speed.
Boccioni was probably influenced by cubism in 1911–12, and about this time he also became interested in
sculpture. In 1912 he published the “Manifesto of Futurist Sculpture,” which anticipated several developments
in modern sculpture. Boccioni advocated the use in sculpture of nontraditional materials such as glass, wood,
cement, cloth, and electric lights, and he called for the combination of a variety of materials in one piece
of sculpture. He also envisioned a new type of sculpture that would mold and enclose the space within itself.
In practice, however, Boccioni's sculpture was much more traditional than his theories. Only "Development of
a Bottle in Space" completely achieves his Futurist vision. His most famous work, "Unique Forms of Continuity
in Space" (1913), is one of the masterpieces of early modern sculpture.
Boccioni enlisted in the army during World War I and was killed by a fall from a horse on Aug. 16, 1916, in
Verona, Italy. He was the most talented of the futurist artists, and his untimely death marked the virtual
end of the movement.
More 20th Century Modern Art ......
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