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Umberto Boccioni 1882 - 1916

Umberto Boccioni was born on October 19, 1882 in Reggio Calabria, Calabria Italy, and died at age 33 years old on August 17, 1916 in Verona, Veneto. Family, friend, or fan, this family history biography is for you to remember Umberto Boccioni.

Umberto Boccioni

October 19, 1882

Reggio Calabria, Calabria, Italy

August 17, 1916

Verona, Veneto, Italy

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Umberto Boccioni Umberto Boccioni (1882 - 1916)

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Umberto Boccioni's History: 1882 - 1916

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Introduction

Famous Italian Artist in the NYC Museum of Modern Art. Department of Modern and Contemporary Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art August 2016 Umberto Boccioni (1882–1916) was the leading artist of Italian Futurism. During his short life, he produced some of the movement’s iconic paintings and sculptures, capturing the color and dynamism of modern life in a style he theorized and defended in manifestos, books, and articles. Born in Reggio Calabria, Boccioni attended technical college in Catania, Sicily, and began his artistic career as a talented draftsman. He moved to Rome in 1899 to train as an artist, first taking drawing lessons with Giovanni Maria Mataloni, an artist who specialized in publicity posters. Boccioni’s skill in creating compelling compositions in cartoons and posters stayed with him throughout his career. The commercial work also provided a small income to support his training as a fine artist. In 1902, he entered the studio of the established painter Giacomo Balla and met fellow student Gino Severini. As seen in Boccioni’s Young Man on a Riverbank (1902; 1990.38.6a), the two young artists would often leave the center of the ancient city to draw landscapes. Balla was known for Divisionism, an Italian style that shared the scientific basis of Pointillism, but with a more intuitive approach to applying strokes of color. Boccioni’s self-portrait (1990.38.4), painted in 1905 while still training with Balla, is in this style. This was the only painting by Boccioni accepted to the annual exhibition of the "Società degli Amatori e Cultori" in Rome that year. He showed others at the Salone di Rifutati, a venue for artists who had been rejected by the official salon. Wanting to discover a city with a more established artistic avant-garde, Boccioni went to Paris in 1906; he found the city and its modern artists exhilarating. The following year, he moved to Venice (with stops in Russia, Warsaw, Vienna, and Padua), where he learned printmaking. His prints of this period depict friends, neighbors, and his mother (1990.38.34). They also hint at his burgeoning interest in the industrial city, which became a more constant subject after his move to Milan in August 1907 (1990.38.36). In Milan, Boccioni met the poet F. T. Marinetti, the leader (and at that time the lone adherent) of the Futurist movement. In February 1909, Marinetti published his famous manifesto in the French newspaper Le Figaro, demanding that Italian culture stop looking backward and embrace modernity. In 1910, Boccioni, along with fellow Milanese painters Carlo Carrà and Luigi Russolo, wrote the “Manifesto of Futurist Painters,” which Balla and Severini also signed. This manifesto shared Marinetti’s enthusiasm for novelty and his distaste for artistic tradition, but failed to articulate what Futurist painting would look like, leading to the follow-up “Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting.” This manifesto called for the abandonment of traditional subjects like the nude. Instead, the Futurists would paint the modern life that surrounded them, following Marinetti’s declaration in “The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism”: “We shall sing the great masses shaken with work, pleasure, or rebellion; we shall sing the multicolored and polyphonic tidal waves of revolution in the modern metropolis.” Boccioni’s first major Futurist painting, The City Rises (1910; Museum of Modern Art, New York), embodies this declaration. The canvas is large-scale like a history painting, transforming the everyday labor of these anonymous workers into a monumental scene—the work’s original title was Lavoro (Labor or Work). Boccioni himself called it “a great synthesis of labor, light, and movement.” The rays of light that stream across parts of the canvas, the contorted poses of the people and animals, and the bright color palette all reinforce the painting’s dynamic sensation of movement. Yet Milan was the industrial hub of a still largely agricultural country, and so the picture, and its preparatory sketches (1990.38.16ab), focus not on a machine, but a horse. Milan’s recently installed street lighting also offered Boccioni new urban subjects, as well as new light effects. He painted two scenes of unrest after dark, the more figurative and Divisionist Riot in the Gallery (1910; Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan), and the almost abstract and highly colorful Riot (1911; Museum of Modern Art, New York; 1990.38.19). The “Technical Manifesto” claimed: “The pallor of a woman eyeing a jeweler’s showcase is more iridescent than all the prisms of the jewels that fascinate her,” a notion that Boccioni gave form in his Modern Idol (1911; Estorick Collection of Modern Italian Art, London; 1990.38.20). In these early Futurist paintings, as in prior works such as his drawing for The Dream (1908–9; private collection; 1990.38.15), the influence of Symbolism and Expressionism—from Italian artists such as Giovanni Segantini and Gaetano Previati and international figures such as Edvard Munch—is still apparent. However, a shift in Boccioni’s style occurred in late 1911 when he encountered Cubist art on a trip to Paris. In a drawing of his lover Ines (1990.38.22b), Boccioni, for the first time, broke down the face into planes, in a similar way to Picasso’s depiction of his lover Fernande in 1909 (1996.403.6). Boccioni’s interest in Cubism is most apparent in the two versions of the triptych States of Mind (first version: 1911, Museo del Novecento, Milan; second version: 1911, Museum of Modern Art, New York). As the title suggests, both sets of pictures relate to Boccioni’s goal of depicting mindsets, in this case, that of farewells, of those who go on a journey and those who stay behind. As apparent in the sketch for the first version of The Farewells (1911; 1990.38.22a) and the ink drawing after the second version of Those Who Go (1912; 1990.38.27), Boccioni integrates the Cubist use of collage-like numerals and straight lines that divide spatial planes into his more expressionistic style, like in Georges Braque’s Still Life with Banderillas (1911; 1999.363.11). Boccioni, however, deployed these motifs for Futurist ends: the dissected planes implied dynamism and the straight lines became “force lines” showing motion. In Elasticity (1912; Museo del Novecento, Milan), the image of the horse and rider is fractured, not to analyze and flatly present their volumes, but to capture and represent their dynamism, fuse them with the pylons, and bring the spectator into the center of the canvas. Unlike the Cubists, Boccioni usually chose animate subjects. However, following the ideas of the French philosopher Henri Bergson, he believed that inanimate objects had inherent movement. Development of a Bottle in Space (1913; 1990.38.2) was the first publicly exhibited still-life sculpture, created less than a year after he wrote to his friend Vico Baer: “These days I am obsessed by sculpture! I believe I have glimpsed a complete renovation of that mummified art.” By using a static object, Boccioni could show the unfurling energy of the bottle, which seems to spiral out of its own original form. His sculpture Unique Forms of Continuity in Space (1913; 1990.38.3) brings together the movement of the striding figure with that of the displaced air around that figure. Boccioni believed that “plastic dynamism” could only be achieved through a synthesis of relative motion (movement in relation to an environment) and absolute motion (dynamism inherent to an object). Unlike other Futurists, such as Balla, who sought to depict motion through repeating limbs, Boccioni wanted to create singular forms that expressed movement—Unique Forms is therefore considered the pinnacle of his sculptural activity. Prior to these plaster sculptures (which were only cast posthumously), Boccioni had made three-dimensional works in mixed media, all of which are now destroyed. The plaster version of Antigraceful (1913; Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, Rome; MMA bronze cast, 1950, 1990.38.1) survives without the metal protrusions—physical versions of “force-lines”—that emanated from the bust of the artist’s mother. Drawings for Boccioni’s even more extravagant mixed-media sculptures (1990.38.25; 1990.38.26) show how he merged figure and environment in a more literal way by intersecting an actual window frame into an early bust. Boccioni returned to mixed media in 1914–15 with Dynamism of a Speeding Horse + Houses (Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice). After Boccioni published Futurist Painting and Sculpture theorizing his art in 1914, his style began to change. Rather than depicting dynamism, his interest in dissolving space with color, and in the work of Post-Impressionist Paul Cézanne, increased. The workers in The Street Pavers (1914; 1990.38.5; see also 1990.38.28, 1990.38.29, and 1990.86) are not in action. Instead, the canvas itself, through the daubs of bright and pastel hues across its surface, becomes the site of movement, drawing the viewer’s eyes across the tangled forms of the composition. Boccioni, like his fellow Futurists, was an ardent interventionist, campaigning for Italy’s entry into World War I on the side of the Allies. When Italy joined the war in 1915, he volunteered to fight. In August 1916, during cavalry exercises with his regiment, Boccioni fell from his horse. He died the next day at the age of thirty-three. Despite his premature death, he remains the best-known artist of the Futurist movement.
10/19

1882

Birthday

October 19, 1882

Birthdate

Reggio Calabria, Calabria Italy

Birthplace

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Military Service

He joined the calvary and fell off his horse and died at 33.
Professional Career

Biography Umberto Boccioni was born on 19 October 1882 in Reggio Calabria. His father was a minor government employee, originally from the Romagna region in the north, and his job included frequent reassignments throughout Italy. The family soon relocated further north, and Umberto and his older sister Amelia grew up in Forlì (Emilia-Romagna), Genoa, and finally Padua. At the age of 15, in 1897, Umberto and his father moved to Catania, Sicily, where he would finish school. Some time after 1898, he moved to Rome and studied art at the Scuola Libera del Nudo of the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma. He also studied under the Liberty-style poster artist Giovanni Mataloni. The little known about his years in Rome is found in the autobiography of his friend Gino Severini (1883–1966), who recalled their meeting in 1901 and mutual interest in Nietzsche, rebellion, life experiences, and socialism. Boccioni's writings at this time already express the combination of outrage and irony that would become a lifelong characteristic. His critical and rebellious nature, and overall intellectual ability, would contribute substantially to the development of the Futurism movement. After building a foundation of skills, having studied the classics through Impressionism, both he and Severini became students of Giacomo Balla (1871–1958), a painter focusing on the modern Divisionist technique, painting with divided rather than mixed color and breaking the painted surface into a field of stippled dots and stripes. Severini wrote, "It was a great stroke of luck for us to meet such a man, whose direction was decisive of all our careers." Self-portrait, 1905, oil on canvas In 1906, he briefly moved to Paris, where he studied Impressionist and Post-Impressionist styles, before visiting Russia for three months, getting a first-hand view of the civil unrest and governmental crackdowns. Returning to Italy in 1907, he briefly took drawing classes at the Accademia di Belle Arti of Venice. He had first visited the Famiglia Artistica, a society for artists in Milan, in 1901. As he traveled from one city to the other, in parallel with his most ground-breaking artistic endeavors, he worked as a commercial illustrator. Between 1904 and 1909 he provided lithographs and gouache paintings to internationally renowned publishing houses, such as Berlin-based Stiefbold & Co. Boccioni’s production in this field shows his awareness of contemporary European illustration, such as the work of Cecil Aldin, Harry Eliott, Henri Cassiers, and Albert Beerts, and attests to his information of contemporary trends in the visual arts more in general. Boccioni moved to Milan in 1907. There, early in 1908, he met the Divisionist painter Gaetano Previati. In early 1910 he met Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, who had already published his Manifesto del Futurismo ("Manifesto of Futurism") in the previous year. On 11 February 1910 Boccioni, with Balla, Carlo Carrà, Luigi Russolo and Severini, signed the Manifesto dei pittori futuristi ("Manifesto of Futurist painters"), and on 8 March he read the manifesto at the Politeama Chiarella theatre in Turin. Boccioni became the main theorist of the artistic movement. "Only when Boccioni, Balla, Severini, and a few other Futurists traveled to Paris toward the end of 1911 and saw what Braque and Picasso had been doing did the movement begin to take real shape." He also decided to be a sculptor after he visited various studios in Paris, in 1912, including those of Georges Braque, Alexander Archipenko, Constantin Brâncuși, Raymond Duchamp-Villon, August Agero and, probably, Medardo Rosso. In 1912 he exhibited some paintings together with other Italian futurists at the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, and the following year returned to show his sculptures at the Galerie La Boétie: all related to the elaboration of what Boccioni had seen in Paris, where he had visited the studios of Cubist sculptors, including those of Constantin Brâncuși, Raymond Duchamp-Villon, and Alexander Archipenko to further his knowledge of avant-garde sculpture. Umberto Boccioni, 1913, Synthèse du dynamisme humain (Synthesis of Human Dynamism), sculpture destroyed In 1914 he published Pittura e scultura futuriste (dinamismo plastico) explaining the aesthetics of the group: "While the impressionists paint a picture to give one particular moment and subordinate the life of the picture to its resemblance to this moment, we synthesize every moment (time, place, form, color-tone) and thus paint the picture. He exhibited in London, together with the group, in 1912 (Sackville Gallery) and 1914 (Doré Gallery): the two exhibitions made a deep impression on a number of young English artists, in particular C.R.W. Nevinson, who joined the movement. Others aligned themselves instead to its British equivalent, Vorticism, led by Wyndham Lewis. "Boccioni's gift was to bring a fresh eye to reality in ways that, we now recognise defined the nature of the modern movement in the visual arts and literature, too." --Michael Glover (art critic, The Independent)
08/17

1916

Death

August 17, 1916

Death date

Unknown
Cause of death

Verona, Veneto Italy
Death location

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Obituary

Biography of Umberto Boccioni Childhood Umberto Boccioni was born in 1882 in Reggio Calabria, a rural region on the southern tip of Italy. His parents had originated from the Romagna region, further north. As a young boy, Boccioni and his family moved frequently, eventually settling in the Sicilian city of Catania in 1897, where he received the bulk of his secondary education. There is little evidence to suggest he had any serious interest in the fine arts until 1901, at which time he moved from Catania to Rome and enrolled at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma (Academy of Fine Arts, Rome). Early Training Umberto Boccioni Biography It was in Rome that Boccioni first connected with his future Futurist collaborator Gino Severini. Both studied under Giacomo Balla, who was renowned as a Divisionist painter, and Boccioni became a loyal student of the style. During these years he also continued his travels in Italy and beyond; he visited Paris for an extended period, where he encountered Impressionism for the first time, and followed this with a sojourn to Russia. During this period, much of the art being produced in Italy was, to Boccioni's mind, rather provincial. In the city of Milan, however, there existed a forward-thinking society of young artists known as the Famiglia Artistica. So, in 1907, Boccioni moved to Milan, where he met Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, the Symbolist poet and theorist. Two years later, on February 20, 1909, Marinetti published the first Futurist manifesto on the front page of the established French newspaper Le Figaro. It quickly attracted followers, among them Boccioni, Severini, Balla, Carlo Carra and Luigi Russolo. But in the years that followed, Boccioni proved to be Futurism's most outspoken proponent and foremost theorist, not to mention primarily responsible for applying Marinetti's example to the visual arts. Mature Period The beginning of Futurism coincided with Boccioni's most prolific period as an artist. On February 11, 1910, under the leadership of Boccioni, the "Manifesto of Futurist Painters" was published by Marinetti's magazine Poesia, and was signed by Severini, Balla and others. Addressed to the "Young Artists of Italy," this new manifesto, much like its predecessor, attacked institutions like museums and libraries, which the Futurists now considered redundant. Boccioni and the Futurists were aiming at one of the Italy's principle claims to prestige, its classical past, which they considered a hindrance to the country's development as a modern power. Later on in the same year Boccioni published the "Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting," also through Marinetti's Poesia. He declared "That all subjects previously used must be swept aside in order to express our whirling life of steel, of pride, of fever and of speed." As a young artist, Boccioni had chosen subjects that simply caught his eye, but as a Futurist, he selected subjects as vehicles for painterly theories. One subject that often inspired him was the city, and it is explored in works like The Forces of the Street and The Street Enters the House (both 1911). In 1912, the Futurist group held an impressive exhibition of paintings at the Bernheim-Jeune in Paris. The centerpiece of Boccioni's contribution was a group of three paintings entitled States of Mind I-III: The Farewells, Those Who Stay, and Those Who Go (all 1911), considered by many to be the artist's most ambitious work thus far. In States of Mind, he attempted to abandon the dependence on any descriptive reality, opting instead to, as he put it, "[have the] colors and forms ... express themselves." In short, Boccioni designed these works to express the Futurist mind-set, in which the past had no bearing on how the artist viewed the world around him. While in Paris, Boccioni visited various artists' studios, including those of Braque, Brâncuși, Archipenko and Duchamp-Villon. What he saw encouraged him to apply his principles to sculpture, resulting in works like The Development of a Bottle in Space (1912) and Unique Forms of Continuity in Space (1913). This new interest also led him to write the "Manifesto of Futurist Sculpture." Late Period and Death Umberto Boccioni Photo In 1913, Boccioni began contributing to the experimental newspaper Lacerba, which had been founded by the Florentine author and Futurist Giovanni Papini (Lacerba published 70 issues between January 1, 1913 and May 22, 1915). With this newspaper, Boccioni and others now had a publication exclusively devoted to promoting the movement's ideas. In April of the following year, Boccioni published his book Futurist Painting and Sculpture, by far the most comprehensive account of Futurist artistic theory written by a founding member. In 1914, the Great War began and quickly spread throughout Europe, and its remarkable ferocity very closely resembled the cleansing violence that the Futurists had long called for. So, in July 1915, Boccioni, along with Marinetti, Russolo and several other Futurists, enrolled with the Lombard Volunteer Cyclist Battalion. The battalion was disbanded in December later that year and during a leave of absence from the war, Boccioni continued to paint, write and lecture. He was called back into service in June 1916, and stationed outside Verona with an artillery brigade. During a training exercise, Boccioni was thrown from his horse and trampled. Still a young man of just thirty-three, Boccioni succumbed to injuries and died a day later on August 17. The Legacy of Umberto Boccioni Although the Futurist movement is most associated with its founder, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, its artistic direction owes much to Umberto Boccioni. He is responsible for producing the seminal texts on Futurist art, and was by and large the movement's most talented, technically proficient, and best educated artist. Despite the brevity of his career, he became a prolific student of avant-garde styles, while simultaneously striving to create something entirely novel: an art that uniquely expressed the speed, dynamism and tragedy of modern-day life.Umberto Boccioni died on August 17, 1916 in Verona, Veneto Italy at 33 years old. He was born on October 19, 1882 in Reggio Calabria, Calabria Italy.

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Umberto Boccioni lived 1 years shorter than the average family member when died at the age of 33.

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