Main content
Modernisms 1900-1980
Course: Modernisms 1900-1980 > Unit 4
Lesson 1: Futurism and the Great War- Italian Futurism: An Introduction
- Futurist Free Word Painting
- Umberto Boccioni and the Futurist City
- Umberto Boccioni, Unique Forms of Continuity in Space
- Umberto Boccioni, "Dynamism of a Soccer Player"
- Gino Severini, Dynamic Hieroglyph of the Bal Tabarin
- Giacomo Balla, Street Light
- Carlo Carrà, Funeral of the Anarchist Galli
- Duchamp-Villon, Horse
- War and dynamism
- 1913 | Schiess-Dusseldorf by Ludwig Hohlwein
- Tate: 1914 & 1915
- British Art and Literature During WWI
© 2023 Khan AcademyTerms of usePrivacy PolicyCookie Notice
Umberto Boccioni, "Dynamism of a Soccer Player"
To learn more about how abstract artists became the radical thinkers of their time, take our online course, Modern Art, 1880-1945 or Pigment to Pixel: Color in Modern and Contemporary Art.. Created by The Museum of Modern Art.
Want to join the conversation?
Let me begin by saying that I love this painting -- the colors, the forms, and the energetic, multi-dimensional composition are amazing. But here's my question: How important is the title to the appreciation of the painting? If this painting were untitled, would it seem as noteworthy?(22 votes)
The name is useful as a label if nothing else. Because it is named, we can discuss it without having to say "that painting by that guy with all the red and blue swirling stuff in it." To me it certainly changes the interpretation to name it, and the woman in the video alludes to this by noting that you tend to look for a soccer player in the painting even though there really is none. So I would say that objectively, it's clearly very important to your experience whether you know its name.(22 votes)
Why did the camera have to jump around so abruptly, only leaving fractions of a second to see the painting at any particular interval? Wouldn't it be better to allow the camera to linger on the painting or slowly scan over it, so that we could actually study it a little and enjoy it more?(16 votes)- I agree with Wudaifu. I would have liked to have focused longer. Like Neurosurgeon, I ended up stopping the action just so I could really see the picture. I would prefer to see fewer images for a longer period of time.(8 votes)
0:30- "no way" - I see a figure that could be interpreted as a soccer player. Why does she say "no way"?(6 votes)
It is her preception and not "the description" of the painting. What you see is what you see. That is beauty of art, it can talk to every viewer in a unique way.(3 votes)
Why did the video move from place to place on the painting too fast? It did not allow my analysis of the canvas.(6 votes)
I agree. It moved too fast and I could not focus on anything(3 votes)
- 1:13- "creating a ruckus" - Why do (some?) modern artists feel this need? What is wrong with the beautiful works of previous masters?(3 votes)
There are some historians who feel that photography caused this shift, which I think helps make sense of modern art a little bit. Historically, some of art's purpose was to capture reality by painting something literally as it was (e.g. portraiture of important people), or trying to document stories from the past (e.g. many religious paintings). With the rise of photography, much of that "documentation" need was being filled by photography rather than painting. Much of the painting world, consequently, shifted to be more focused on capturing abstract concepts: movement, texture, emotion, etc. That freed people during this time to experiment greatly with the form, often causing a big break (or a ruckus) from what came before.(6 votes)
Where is the football and or soccer player?(2 votes)
There isn't really a soccer player I think- it is just a way to make people actually see the paintng.(5 votes)
the painting is beautiful,without any question,but did the painter actually depict a portrait of a soccer player or it was just to attract the viewers towards it?(0 votes)- The key here to look at the tile of the painting - "Dynamism of a Soccer Player." Boccioni does not title his playing as being an actual soccer player, but instead focus on the player's dynamism - their movements and actions. The painting is supposed to evoke feelings of running, kicking, and sliding through the wild shapes and colors, focusing on the abstracted actions instead of an actual human form.(4 votes)
okay how did he pull this off ? anyone think of time it took to make the painting ? how did he mace a soccer player in a flower thingy ? anyone but me see a flower thingy ?(1 vote)
I just love old photos and paintings they are so cool because its cool how they just came up with something like this! and everything else!(1 vote)- I can see that your first use of "they" refers to "old photos and paintings", but I can't figure out to who or what you are referring with the second "they" in your sentence. Can you help me?(1 vote)
So where is the soccer player(1 vote)
0:30Video transcript
(drum beat music) Ann: The Italian futurists
were one group of artists who were doing incredible things in 1913. Thinking about art as something
that had to be for the new century. Speed, noise, machinery, and
the city became a key part of all of their paintings. Dynamism of a Soccer Player
challenges any viewer to actually find a soccer player:
two arms, two legs, a face. No way. Colors and shapes
moving, running, kicking. Your eye is brought to the next
place or to a place further down. There's only one way when you look
at a yellow form or a red form that you can see that
form which is in relation to the colors circulating around it. The brush strokes are extremely
visible, they are tangible its material. Photography which was little
more than half a century old had an enormous impact. Eadweard Muybridge did photography
in sequence: bop, bop, bop, bop. They wanted to do that in painting too. The futurists believed
that part of being modern was not only painting modern
things but creating a ruckus. When their pictures
appeared at exhibitions they issued manifestos, they have
lectures, they had performances that absolutely provoked the people
in attendance to realizing, "Wow." Even if we didn't understand the picture, what we're doing is being
a witness to something that is upsetting centuries of tradition. (drum beat music)