Page 44 - Studio International - January 1973

properties of movement, change, the potential interest in patterns, Severini has no desire to
of explosion or corruption. record past movement, his images have no blur,
Boccioni was in his superb and magical nor any attempt to suggest speed. They are
pictures able to paint the future movement of an broken up into separate, perfect images, like the
object — what, in terms of his sculpture, he later view through smashed spectacles. Severini, of all
called 'lines of force' : 'Each object reveals by the futurists, is the one most unashamedly
its lines how it would be decomposed according making pictures, applying colour and declaring
to the tendencies of its forces.' Though more his enchantment with images, which suggest
than merely expressing this potential direction motion only by repetition and which never
and structure of component parts, Boccioni's compromise the steady eye of the painter. In
lines of force are actually straining from the this exhibition Severini's picture-making seems
centre. more decorative, less committed to the
Carra, on the other hand, is much more Giacomo Balla philosophy of Futurism, and a bit too elegant to
The Rhythm of the Violinist 1912
willing to depict the perfect calm at the point Oil on canvas, 75 x 52 cm. enter the struggle for its visual expression.
of maximum tension. His abstract Coll : Mrs Eric Estorick, London Russolo is, on the other hand, manifestly
`decompositions' have greater stasis, they affirm depicting its traces. Balla was older than the inelegant. He has no delicacy, no tact, not much
the existence of something permanent at the other futurists and not so able to rethink his talent as a painter, but a very infective joy and
centre of movement. More than Boccioni's, long aesthetic training. A successful realist resolution to carry out the artistic commands of
Carra's paintings accept the limits of the canvas, painter, and teacher of divisionism to both the group. His pictures are heavy-handed
of the art-act. His works of 1912-13, the period Boccioni and Severini, Balla's commitment to affirmations of futurist aesthetics, illustrations to
of greatest success for futurist painting, are futurism was only a stage on the road to the text. It is to his pictures that critics point
manifestly solid, beautiful, but they are more abstraction. His later paintings, of which in this when they declare that the movement was more
accepting of the reality of appearances and less exhibition Flags on the Altar of the Fatherland notable for its theories than its results. 'What
convinced of the mysticism of the object than 1915 is the best-known example, are pure this exhibition makes clear, however, is the
those of Boccioni. abstractions which suggest movement by the range of expression of these 'theories' and the
Balla is wholly concerned with appearances, merely symbolic use of curves, like the amount of real success that they had.
and with movement only insofar as it could letterheads of Italian industrialists. Russolo, loyal futurist henchman, eventually
conceivably be recorded — by the eye or by the Severini's brand of Futurism has as its abandoned painting to concentrate on musical
long-exposure camera. Not concerned with the starting point the early futurist goal of putting innovations and noise machines, of which some
future properties of matter — with `the spectator in the centre of the picture.' are exhibited here.
decomposition or the tendencies of dynamism — Unlike Boccioni in his studies of dynamism, or Part of the strength of this marvellous
Balla is interested in their past, in the recorded Balla in his recordings of paths of flight or exhibition lies in its presentation of the various
history of the violinist's hand (The Rhythm of speed, Severini was never able to forget himself interests of the futurist movement. The totality
the Violinist) in the Paths of Movement of a as the subject upon which objects were to of the futurist vision was such as to embrace not
Swift, where the paths have been abstracted to produce reactions. The dynamism in his pictures only painting and sculpture, architecture, music,
an undulating line. His very accurate studies of depends very much on the early futurist ideal of photography, cinema, poetry, but even clothes —
speeding cars — abstract wedges of direction and depicting 'pure sensation' but the sensation is_ design, cooking and — oddly — the rights of
physical forces — are mere pretence at always his own. In his many studies of dancers women. A selection of the many inventions,
prediction. Unlike Boccioni's studies of Severini is always the subject of the painting. He experiments, belligerent proposals and
dynamism, these depend on the direct never allows the outer world to enter the picture; manifestoes are exhibited here with
experience of the sensation of speed. They are the figure of the dancer is all but it is always photographs of the futurist evenings and events.
narrative pictures, obsessed with the past dancing around the painter. He is interested in Marinetti, 'caffeine of Europe' and impresario
history of the moving object, not so much the moving image only insofar as it will create extraordinary created around himself a
presenting the concept of movement as interesting patterns for his eye. Unlike Balla's movement which transformed everything it
touched. The impact of the futurist aesthetic on
Russian, French, German, and British painting,
even on Hollywood and Madison Avenue was
enormous. A fact which has a lot less to do with
theorizing and a lot more to do with genuine
achievement than is usually admitted. The
results of the futurist absurdities, courage,
commitment to the unknown survived the death
of the movement in World War I, and the ironic
fates of its members (Boccioni really did die
falling from a horse). It reinfused the
mainstream of romanticism and the principles
of progress in art. The futurists lived before
total war and the findings of ecologists had
sapped the confidence of industrial man, and it
is hard now to accept their heroism for what it
was. Theirs was a last gesture of faith, in an
age of innocence, before the fall and before the
realization that speed kills.

Boccioni
Study for Dynamism of a Cyclist 1913. 20.9 x 3o.8 cm.
Coll: Civico Gabinetto
dei Disegni
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