Futurism: An Anthology edited by Lawrence Rainey, Christine Poggi and Laura Wittman
Yale University Press, £40

Of all the great movements seeking to come to terms with the 20th century, Futurism is the most paradoxical and problematic. Initially, it was challenging and radical. Drawing on ideas from Freud and Marx, the leader of the movement, the Italian writer FT Marinetti, launched his incendiary Futurist Manifesto in Le Figaro in 1909. In it, he proclaimed the love of danger, admired courage, boldness and rebelliousness, the beauty of speed and, most difficult, the glorification of war – “beautiful ideas worth dying for”.

Among other “isms”, it opposed moralism and feminism. Marinetti expressed a passionate loathing for the past, but looked only to the future, praising youth, technology, violence, the car, the aeroplane. The manifesto is reproduced in this anthology in full.

With such heady objectives, Futurism, which started as a literary movement, rapidly attracted the attention of artists of many sorts who were inspired by the scale and thrust of this male-dominated and misogynistic movement. Painters, such as Balla and Severini, sculptors, most notably Boccioni, and architects, including Chiattone, produced stirring and inventive work.

Although centred mostly in Italy, Futurism was taken up across Europe, even reaching Britain where the movement was supported enthusiastically by Wyndham Lewis and Christopher Nevinson, who collaborated with Marinetti to write Futurism and English Art, advocating “art that is strong, virile and

anti-sentimental”, which was published in The Observer.

Futurism, with its ambitious intentions, hoped that it could transform the world rather than merely reflect it. Yet, however impressive the achievements over the five years from 1909, the movement was overtaken by real life events with the all too real outbreak of war. For Marinetti it was a welcome resolution to what he saw as society’s problems, but for others it marked the end of the movement. Marinetti had allied Futurism’s utopian ambitions with ffascist politics, and although he sought to revive the ideas after the war, the movement had lost its momentum.

With useful introductions to the sections by the editors, comprehensive footnotes and an extensive bibliography, together with black and white illustrations of art, graphics and architecture produced in response to Futurist ideas, this is an essential reference book. For all its problems and contradictions, Futurism was one of the most stirring and challenging movements of the 20th century, looking forward rather than to the past.

Emmanuel Cooper