Stemming from Cubism, Futurism continued to focus on movement and geometric shapes, but also depicted society's optimistic views of technology. Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, the founder of futurism, described it as more of a lifestyle than an art form and called himself the "caffeine of Europe". The automobile was at the center of the vision for the futurists, and they tried to depict this growing movement and energy in paintings through the use of bright colors and swift brush strokes. Although short-lived, Futurism influenced art on an international level through its shocking and controversial ideas and beliefs reflecting European's struggle to accept technology prior to World War Europe was going through a forty-year span of peace during the late 1800's and early 1900's and futurism reflected the optimism of a large segment of the society at the time. Beginning in Italy, a technologically backward country, Futurism embraced the new age of machinery and strived on the originality of thought.
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Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 (1912) by Marce...
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876-1944)Europeans went from generally living in rural areas to suddenly seeing the uprisings of towns and cities in the 1890's. Tall buildings, cars, and trains also introduced people to a new way of viewing the world around them. Progression took over the society and propelled art to try to capture these changes on paper.
Futurism reflected these changes by utilizing cubist techniques to create the sense of movement. Their subjects changed from landscapes and still objects to moving objects such as animals, cars, and machines. Giacomo Balla's "Speeding Auto (Auto en course, etude de vitesse)" utilizes thick outward brush strokes to indicate the movement of a car and the passing space around it. Balla clearly uses cubist shapes and colors to depict an almost abstract painting of an automobile. Balla's painting depicts how futurism is a descendant of cubism, and uses...