Description

Concepts of progress, be they technological, scientific or cultural, are central to modernism’s rhetoric and nowhere made more explicit than in the manifestos of the Futurist movements of the early twentieth century. This intermediate module will use Futurism as a lens through which to examine features of modernism’s relationship to aspects of modernity such as urbanisation, industrialisation, speed, mass culture and world war ranging across the diverse array of Futurist production from art to poetry, architecture and music. The module will adopt a critical standpoint which will examine how claims for progressiveness were often tempered with chauvinism, nationalism and imperialist ambition. While focused principally on Italian Futurism, the module will also consider related groups of artists in other locations such as Russia and Britain, and may also consider the recuperation of Futurist imagery in unlikely contexts such as the more recent phenomenon of Afrofuturism.

Objectives

By the end of this module, students should have

• a familiarity with Futurist artists, writers, architects, musicians and their work
• an understanding of Futurism’s position in the history of modernism
• an understanding of critical approaches to modernism and how they pertain to Futurism
• a knowledge of the contexts in which Futurism has appeared

Preliminary reading

The main course book we will be using this term and highly recommended to purchase is: Lawrence Rainey et al. Futurism: An Anthology (Yale University Press, 2009). Last year I managed to negotiate a deal with the campus Blackwell bookshop where students could buy it for the preferential price of £25. I am hoping for something similar this year but waiting to hear back regarding the bookshop’s conversations with the Yale sales rep. Just about all of last year’s group bought a copy, so, if you happen to know students in the year above, you could also ask if any of them would like to sell their copy on to you.

Rainey’s book has superseded Umbro Apollinio’s Futurist Manifestos (Thames and Hudson, 1973), which was reissued in a new edition by Tate Publishing in 2009. However, you get a lot for very little money with that edition and it is worth looking out for second hand.

Useful introductory overviews of Futurism are Caroline Tisdall and Angelo Borzello, Futurism (Thames and Hudson, 1978) and Richard Humphreys, Futurism (Tate Publishing, 1999). For a more recent survey see the catalogue of the 2009 Tate exhibition by Ester Cohen, Matthew Gale, Didier Ottinger and Giovanni Lista, Futurism (Tate Publishing, 2009), which is very well illustrated.

The most significant scholarly study of Futurism to come out recently and one that we will use a lot on the module is Christine Poggi, Inventing futurism: The Art and Politics of Artificial Optimism (Princeton University Press, 2009).

Perhaps the most important place for the publication of new scholarship on Futurism has been the journal Modernism/Modernity. Have a look at the special issue on ‘Marinetti and the Futurists’ (vol.1, no.3, September 1994), available on-line through the library catalogue, some articles of which we will be referring to this term.

Finally, if anybody will be in London over the summer, I recommend a visit to the Estorick Collection in Islington, a permanent collection of modern Italian art, with some fantastic Futurists works in it. Tate Modern also has some iconic objects on regular display as well, such as Umberto Boccioni’s sculpture Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, which will be the focus of one of our seminars.