F U T U R I S M, this great word that no matter from where you are,
makes you think about something that belongs to “ tomorrow “. Everything
started though in the XX century with Ferruccio Busoni’s essays, where he
expressed his passion for speed, technology and violence. The plane, car and
industrial city became futurists’ favorite and outlined human’s glory over
nature. Later, architects like Otto Wagner and Adolf Loos started the first sketches
of their Citta Nuova, the new city, that became the symbol of a new era.
Since then, the
value of the architecture relies only in the original disposal of the primary
materials violently colored. The massive, heroic constructions define the industrial
expressionism. Futurists’ vision consisted in an extremely industrialized and mechanical city, like a net of interconnected
buildings, a purely urban universe, alive and dynamic. Their tools and symbol
to capture everything were the sky-scrapers, as a proof to industrial science
greatness.
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| https://www.pinterest.com/pin/464715255277334089/ |
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They were able to “
dream “ so big and sketch the cities so different from how they were before
because they acted as there was no tradition on their shoulders. Elisa Franco
from the Spanish course also spotted this idea: “ es necesario empezar a
replantear la arquitectura desde cero, ya que en el momento que ésta rompe con
la tradición no hay nada más que hacer; y el hecho de haber perdido el sentido
de la monumentalidad les hace llegar a una nueva conclusión: Plantean un nuevo
modelo de ciudad”. Their new city has to most of all be f u n c
t i o n a l , with a swiss watch precision, it has to push the boundaries of
science and technology.
An interesting
detail about their conception was their conclusion that humans and obviously
the human mind is in a continuous
change, it evolves and it is reshaped by conceptions, new ideas, evolution of psychology
etc. Thus, they don’t accept the idea that a building or a city is something
static. They believe that these elements have to metamorphose in detail and match with the new shape that humans’
mind is. Furthermore, they see the city
as a human body or a car, a complex system
that relies on i n t e r c o n n e c t i
o n s . A system where every single tiny part is important and in absence of
which the system is prone to malfunction, a chain where every piece has the
space to get redefined and occupy as much space as needed without compromising
the outer shape, elements that have the freedom to experiment and evolve, but
still achieve the same functions and aim the same result. As an analogy, the
following is a good projection of their ideas.
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| https://www.pinterest.com/pin/139541288424366762/ |
From this metaphor
we can conclude that the buildings become versatile dots that occupy a certain
space at a certain time in the city, from which one can trace lines to
interconnect them, lines that became the symbol for the relationships established
between the edifices. This idea of a city
seen as a net is also present in futurist mentalities and the following images would be close to their vision :
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power-law-in-data-doesnt-make-it-real/ |
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| http://technicity.osu.edu/share-a-photo-that-shows-the-use-of-a-specific-type-of-technology-that-you-support-in-technicity/archived |
They enjoyed VIOLENCE of shapes, v e l o c
i t y of movement, massive multiplication, impressive high silhouettes and they were showing everything
with pride, not only in the shapes, but also in the materials chosen. They
played a lot with mirror and glass.
Why? Because everybody knows what are their properties: to create an incredible
game of multiplication, distortion, reflection, refraction, amplification of
the perspective, inversion. They could make the contours of their building
vanish and create the effect of “ hide and seek “: they created a shape that
was not
very visible, but was playing a huge impact acting as a magnifier and multiplier for the environment. All this
illusion game would create more speed, would bring more violence to the city,
more confusion and divisions. Almost like a disease that makes the body cells
react against to the organism and then multiplying till the whole system
becomes infected and collapses. A building becomes a particle that keeps reshaping
and spreading into million pieces until it fills the entire space. A closer
look in the materials, more towards painting and photography really, is
reflected in Maura McDonnell’s document (http://dahphd.ie/mauramcdonnell/dah/futurism-movement-and-sensation/
), where she wonders “ how was something so ephemeral
and invisible to the eye as speed to be rendered in painting? Something
invisible but felt?
In the two painting manifestos
and in particular the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting, added to the
futurist list of statements is the celebration of science – ‘victorious
science’. Science could reveal what was hidden in nature and to our
vision, x-rays had penetrated the ‘opacity’ and materiality of the body.
Chronophotography and the time-lapse photography of Eadweard Muybridge and Étienne-Jules Marey had provided a means of analysing and
seeing movement via an image by breaking down movement into a sequence of
superimposed images, emulated then in futurist painting.”
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Giacomo Balla, Speed of a Motorcycle, 1913, Oil on Canvas
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The aim of the
futurists is to make the decoration vanish
and give space to a FUNCTIONAL and dynamic base that completely fulfill a human’s need. This idea is also reflected
in Laura Prats, a Spanish course student’s document : “Lo decorativo tiene que
desaparecer, ser abolido, hacer que no sea una copia del pasado, aplicar destreza
técnica y científica. La transformación será el final de la arquitectura
monumental y podremos empezar a construir los nuevos cimientos de la nueva
ciudad”. Moreover, the human becomes the base and the human mind becomes the
tool that creates the city, in relationship with it’s emerging needs. As an
example, I think that the following images express this idea.
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Built-On-Plants-Reflect-Humans-Relationship-With-Nature/
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is-what-your-brain-would-look-like-as-a-subway-map/
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As a conclusion, although
the entire system of ideas that composes the term FUTURISM is really wide and deep, but the feelings of revolt, rebellion, strike, opposition, aggressiveness and progress
could be highlighted more genuine only by quoting from the architects: “We feel that we
are no longer part of the people from the cathedrals, the palaces and the court
halls are, but the people of the great hotels, the railway stations, the
immense streets, the huge ports, covered markets […]., We have to invent and
build the futuristic city […]. “(quoted. according to Conrad, p 32.34). “- Beauty, it is only available in a fight. One
work without an aggressive character can
not be identified as a masterpiece […] We will destroy the museums, libraries
and academies of every kind … […] we will sing for those.. […] the tide of
revolutions […] -. “(quoted. according to Marinetti, S. 19:28)
