FUTURISM: art, politics and propaganda, Study Guides, Projects, Research of History

Download FUTURISM: art, politics and propaganda and more Study Guides, Projects, Research History in PDF only on Docsity!

Italian and Russian

FUTURISMS

avant-gardes in the 20

th^ century’s cultural

and political landscape

You can read or present the PowerPoint in an interactive way.

There are buttons that allow you to open new slides and reach new contents. Remember:

Blue words  link to further information or web resources

White words  tasks and puzzles

 play button for multimedia material

 back button to return at the previous slide.

What are avant-gardes in art?

Avant-gardes are artistic and intellectual

movements which usually involve

painting, sculpture, architecture, music,

literature...

They occurred most notably (but not

only) in Europe during the 20

th

century.

They are so called because they

experiment new techniques and create

new concepts in their works. Thus they

are at the ‘avant-garde’ in exploring

new possibilities in art.

Before starting

…

Guggenheim Museum, New York.

Those were years of great changes in Europe and

avant-garde art worked in response to industrial

development, world conflicts, the rise and decline

of the idea of progress, and other social issues.

Let’s see some futuristic examples:

F. R. Mariani, Air Whirl ,

1938, oil on canvas,

Macerata.

L. Russo, Solidity in the fog ,

1910, oil on canvas, Venice.

T. De Lempicka, Self portrait in the

green Bugatti , 1932, oil on panel,

Switzerland.

O. Rozanova, The factory

and the bridge , 1913, oil

on canvas, New York.

FUTURISM was one

of the well-known

artistic avant-garde

movement of the

past century.

In 1909 the Italian

poet Tommaso

Marinetti

published on Le

Figaro in Paris the

first Futurism’s

manifesto :

Marinetti and his circle were influenced by

contemporary philosophy, like Nietzsche ’s

demolition of traditional values and Bergson ’s

subjective conception of time.

They also wanted to use in their art mass

media ’s communication techniques.

Marinetti used the so-called “free words”

technique with which he could cut and paste

words from papers in his poetries to evoke

new communication languages and tones.

Italian futurists had been

publishing manifestos for

years in which they

explained their painting,

architecture, sculpture…

• (^) Art finds its objects in the

new surrounding reality and

materiality;

• (^) It should not be imitative (of

nature, of academic rules...)

but completely original;

• (^) It should present the use of

vivid colours, marked shapes,

fragmentation of perception

of objects and their fusion

with the background.

During the period of fascist totalitarianism, Futurism became

instrumental for all kind of propaganda.

In Italy Futurism had great success. It perfectly mingled

with the bourgeois social values of the time. And some

futurist artists were politically engaged too. They were

fascinated by the emergent fascist party of Benito

Mussolini. He seemed to embody the strength, the

power and also the violence of futuristic performances.

Poster of Fascist’s

Revolution

exhibition, 1928.

A. G. Ambrosi,

Airportrait of Aviator Mussolini ,

G. Dottori, the Duce , 1933.

From the 1910s to the 1930s, Futurism became well-known not only in

European cities but also in Japan and North and South America.

In 1912 in Moscow an other manifesto

called ‘ A Slap in the Face of Public Taste ’ was

published by the Hylaea’s poets (Burlyuk brothers,

Kamensky, Khlebnikov, Kruchenykh, Mayakovsky).

Russian Futurism emerged through literature,

poetry , cinema, theatre, music.

They invented the so-called

ZAUM , or transreason, linguistic

experiment. It consists in using

words not to convey meaning

but for their aural effect.

V. Khlebnikov, cover of

Zangezi , 1922.

If in Italy some futuristic artists were very close to the fascist dictatorship,

in Russia a great part of them

supported the Bolshevik Revolution

of 1917 and communism.

B. M. Kustodijew, the Bolshevik , 1920, oil on

canavas, Moscow.

Y. Annenkov, Trotsky ,

FUTURISM

Read what the Italian communist philosopher Gramsci wrote in 1920-21:

“Futurists did this job in the field of bourgeois culture: they destroyed, destroyed,

destroyed, without concern about their new creations […] were superior to the ones

destroyed: they believed in themselves, in young energies, they had the clair idea that

our time, the time of the great industry, of the great working city, of intense and

agitated life, must have new shapes, new arts, new philosophy, new habits, new

language: they had this defined revolutionary conception.”

What do you think about this statement? In spite of their political orientations, can

you see similarities between fascist Futurism and communist Futurism? Is their

connection with politics really destroying the past and tradition? Is this really a

revolution? Why?

FASCISM

COMMUNISM

Cover of the book

The Fascist’s First

Book. In which

you can find

answers about

fascist polics and

ethics.

become permanent as its most

influential artists involved

either died in the war, or

became attracted by other

avant-garde (including

abstract art, surrealism,

dadaism, metaphysical painting

, constructivism, suprematism,

…) Others preferred to return to

more traditional artistic

directions.

Even though….

K. Malevich,

Supremus no. 55 ,

1916, oil on canvas, Muzeul de

Artă, Krasnodar.