Futurism - what is it? Artistic form and ideological filling of the movement

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

The end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century is a time of active search for new forms in art, free from the pattern-detailed transmission of reality. This search and revolutionary ferment in the minds of many representatives of European youth led to the emergence of new artistic and social trends. The myth was cultivated that art is obliged to turn (and will certainly turn) the world. One of the first swallows was futurism. What is futurism? Literally futurum - "future".

The founder of the movement is the Milanese poet F. Marinetti, the most prominent representatives in painting are U. Boccioni, D. Balla, D. Severini. The history of futurism begins in 1909: Marinetti published the first manifesto in the French magazine Le Figaro, in which he called for throwing all previous cultural values into the dustbin of history and, based on the latest technical achievements, to form the type of a person of the future. Artists soon also published their manifesto. Laterthere were many manifestos, and they all called for abandoning the past in the name of moving forward.

Unfortunately, futurism was not limited to art: it was politicized through and through, and distinguished by harshness and radicalism. This led him to an ideological collapse: some members of the movement distanced themselves from the group, while others created their own political party in the eighteenth year, which soon fell under the banner of Mussolini.

Futurism in art is broken lines, sharp color contrasts, pronounced disproportions, incomplete outlines, the presence of urban and technical motifs. If the predecessors of the avant-garde, the Impressionists, were at the forefront of the search for a new form, now the form fades into the background, any canons are rejected, only the artist's attitude is important. It should be said that not only Futurism was distinguished by this, that such an attitude towards creativity is also characteristic of other avant-garde movements: cubism, abstractionism, expressionism, surrealism, Dadaism. The philosophy of the avant-garde is aimed at the creative individualization of the individual, at opposing it to an impersonal being, including mass culture. At the same time, the ideological filling of the currents is different: if futurism, in fact, appeals to violence, then expressionism (anti-fascist Pablo Picasso and others), on the contrary, expresses protest against the violence that has engulfed the world through torn and broken lines.

In Russia, this genre took root best in the field of literature, won the hearts of many poets of the Silver Age, gave rise to a ragged style of versification,an overabundance in the texts of combinations and symbols, sometimes devoid of any meaning. Khlebnikov is considered the main pillar of Russian futurism. Pasternak, Mandelstam have corresponding motives, even in Yesenin's later texts there is futurism. What is, for example, "The Black Man"? The style is obviously not classic.

One of the most consistent futurists was Mayakovsky. "A Cloud in Pants" is a masterpiece of the genre both in form and in spirit, and the poet remained true to his chopped style until the end of his life.

Futurists enthusiastically accepted the October Revolution. But this feeling was not mutual, since the proletarian movement was headed by people with a huge cultural baggage. In particular, Lenin, in his speech to the Komsomol members at the Third Congress, emphasized the great importance of cultural heritage and mentioned futurism, that such art was incomprehensible to him.

Futurism as an art movement lasted only a couple of decades. But his spirit survived. The hi-tech style, which arose in the fifties under the influence of science fiction literature and is still popular in architecture and design, is essentially the same futurism, only on a new round. He is devoid of political ambitions and radicalism in general, but inherited from futurism its positive component: a look into the future and faith in progress, in the ultimate triumph of reason over conservatism.