Page 65 - PROTAGONIST-131

Previous page, Umberto Boccioni, Forme uniche della continuità
nello spazio (1913), bronze, h 126.4 cm, Museo del Novecento,
Milan, Italy

At the beginning of the last century, the urge arose to the colour intervenes, but it does not take time to spread out,
translate the experience of living the thrill of speed, into art- because the next mark already presses in, a new boundary
work. To summarise in a painting, a sculpture, and before quickly appears that cannot contain tones and timbres be-
that in a poem, the momentum toward modernity, celebrat- cause segments of silhouettes appear that lightning conquer
ing the new technical and intellectual possibilities; thus fu- the horizon.
turism was born, the first artistic reflection of the emerging What we see does not have time to form itself in the ‘ret-
relationship, interdependence, between man and machine. ina’ of the canvas, it is too fast: we are left to enjoy the specta-
A modern love story, futurist in fact, that exploded then and cle of shapes in the making, of the interpenetration of colours
still fascinates us today. and their echo, imagining that the journey towards art, fast
An ode to technology, science, and progress that today and powerful, brings us face to face with the masterpiece.
has led us all the way to the development of artificial intel- Umberto Boccioni, a dazzling artist, also proposes the
ligence. All extensions, even prostheses that make man marriage of man and space celebrated by speed in sculp-
more ready and powerful, in a vertigo of self–expansion that ture. What looks like armour is the fusion of body and air,
means knowledge and, therefore, future. everything stretches, precedes, and creates a wake. Speed
So here is the breakthrough of an art that has to engage makes us cross the atmosphere transforming our figure
us in this adventure. And the artists set to work: an unprece- into a being ready for tomorrow. Also to remember the 1915
dented pictorial sign is concentrated on canvas, made of ge- Carica di lancieri, furious, violent, as if the Renaissance Bat-
ometries that reverberate with lines and colour. tle of San Romano by Paolo Uccello had come to life and the
Reality breaks up, it becomes pure dynamism of trac- armies were finally hurling themselves at each other, with
es and ghosts of traces, as if speed were fragmenting reality all the clangour and vehemence that had been withheld for
and shapes were losing their association with their own col- centuries.
our, colour that slips back, creating new independent silhou- Mario Sironi’s work transports us elsewhere: a centaur
ettes, being preceded by its own outline which is faster, by its riding a motorbike who cannot wait to escape from the can-
own black border that quickly overtakes them, waiting for a vas, to escape from the work to conquer perspectives that
next reunion in the future more future than now. are not just natural, but non–Euclidean spaces. A universe of
Giacomo Balla’s 1913 Velocità astratta (“abstract speed”) points of escape, in which every destination means a future.
and Velocità astratta + rumore (“abstract speed + sound”) A world of great positivity, such confidence in what is to
painted in the same years, are wonderful examples, start- come that you shout it at the top of your voice, such a hurry
ing with the title that is a programme in itself, a manifesto to reach the next day that you burn up time and space, that
of intentions. One sees lines, semicircles in sequence, like you reject the past, compress today and launch yourself into
vibrations that chase each other, spreading through space; tomorrow. The future cannot wait.

Protagonist Art 63