An Analysis Of Mark Antliff's The Fourth Dimension And Futurism
Mark Antliff, “The Fourth Dimension and Futurism: A Politicized Space,” The Art
Bulletin, Vol. 82, No. 4 (Dec. 2000), pp. 720-733.
1. What does Antliff explore, with respect to the Futurists' incorporation of aesthetic theories of time and space? Whose notions of temporality and intuitive consciousness does the author analyze? (p. 720)
Antliff explores the futurists’ incorporations of aesthetic theories of time and space into a utopian campaign to transform the consciousness of the Italian citizenry and inaugurate a political revolt against Italy’s democratic institutions.
The author analyzes the notions of temporality and intuitive consciousness of
Linda Henderson, which are derived from Henri Bergson.
2. According to Antliff, …show more content…
in contrast to other proponents of the fourth dimension, how did Boccioni assimilate spatial concepts into the Futurists' highly politicized campaign to renew Italy? What was the artist’s political program premised on and to what end? (pp. 720-721)
According to Antliff, in contrast to the proponents of the fourth dimension,
Boccioni assimilated spatial concepts into the Futurists’ high politicized campaign to renew Italy. The futurist correlation of the fourth dimension with a Bergsonian spatial-temporal flux made up of “force forms” and “force lines”, unfettered by the limitations of three-dimensional space or measured intuition and an anti- materialistic call for national regeneration and imperialist expansion. The artist’s political program was premised on the politics of Italian nationalism.
3. According to Antliff, whose notion of aestheticized politics does Futurist imagery thoroughly contradicts? Instead, what must any proper reading of their art take into account? (p. 721)
Futurist imagery thoroughly contradicts Walter Benjamin’s notion of aestheticized politics. Any proper reading of their art must take into account the anti- materialistic premises undergirding that disavowal, premises that Zeev Sternhell and Emilio Gentile have identified as fundamental to Italian proto-Fascism.
4. In Boccioni’s Plastic Dynamism, how do the Futurists experience intuition?
To what end? (p. 721)
In Boccioni’s Plastic Dynamism, the Futurists experience intuition by rejecting an art of “external appearances”, they are “living life in its dynamic conception”, and they enter an object’s “interior” and experience its living dynamism by intuition.
Only through intuition are the Futurists able to experience the “violent emotions of movement and speed” that “inspire new plastic ideas.”
5. Why did Boccioni claim Cubist and academic methods were indistinguishable? What was the effect of Picasso's "study of form"? (p.
721)
Boccioni claimed that Cubist and academic methods were indistinguishable because of their shared reliance on “intellectual” and “scientific” techniques that left the artist (and beholder) external to the object itself. The effect of
Picasso’s “study of form” was that the analysis of the object was always at the expense of the object.
6. On what basis does Antliff suggest virtually every aspect of Boccioni's critique had its roots in Bergson's metaphysics? (p. 722)
Antliff suggests virtually that every aspect of Boccioni’s critique had its roots in
Bergson’s metaphysics on the basis that Bergson identifies relative knowledge with all forms of “analysis” utilized in “positive science”; absolute knowledge, “can only be given in an intuition” because intuition is the “sympathy by which one is transported into the interior of an object in order to coincide with what there is unique” about it. To Boccioni, the Futurist intuition of an object’s interior dynamism then is a form of “absolute” knowledge, whereas the analytic methods developed by other movements relegated them to “relative” knowledge.
7. What does Bergson claim in Creative Evolution with regard to the artist’s ability to potentially possess intuitive vision? (p. 722)
In Creative Evolution, Bergson claimed with regard to the artist’s ability to potentially possess intuitive vision that if “our faulty of seeing should be made one with the act of willing,” our vision would overcome its utilitarian function and, through an effort of intuition, discern the melody of inner duration.
8. According to Boccioni, what did the Cubists do to form? As a result, what did Cubist technique condemn the artist to do? (p. 722)
According to Boccioni, the Cubists divided a singular form into its component parts and juxtaposed these parts across the surface of a canvas, to reveal “the planes of the object that its accidental position prevents us from seeing.” As a result, the Cubist technique condemns the artists to circle endlessly around an object in order to analyze its external appearances. Unable to perceive duration, the Cubist was restricted to the realm of the relative, unable to reach the “intuitive absolute.” 9. How did Boccioni introduce the Futurist concept of the “fourth dimension”
with his own Bergsonian conception of that idea, by contrasting it to the
Cubists' "false claim" to the term? (pp. 722-723)
Boccioni introduced the Futurist concept of the “fourth dimension” with his own
Bergsonian conception of that idea, by contrasting it to the Cubists’ “false claim” to the term by asserting that the Cubists utilized a “measured and finite fourth dimension” to transcribe their “rotating point of view” around an object onto a canvas, whereas the Futurists fourth dimension was “a continuous projection of forces and forms intuited in their infinite unfolding.”
10. According to Antliff, what did the fourth dimension constitute to Boccioni?
How did Boccioni seek to grasp it? (p. 723)
According to Antliff, to Boccioni the fourth dimension constituted of the unfolding of temporality into space in the guise of “forces or directions,” and it is an intuition of these “force forms” that produces the “lyrical deformations” of his art.
Boccioni grasps it by the distinction between “spatial” and “temporal knowledge,”
Boccioni’s awareness of Bergson’s definition of “extensity” as an intuitive notion of space.
11. Rather than retrospectively analyzing motion as a trajectory between two points, how did the Futurists experience motion? (p. 724)
The Futurists experienced motion as the mental and material unfolding of a creative act.
12. How does Boccioni define dynamism? (p. 724)
Boccioni defines dynamism as the synthesis of relative and absolute motion, as an evolutionary concept of plastic reality, the form-type, the form of forms, the continuity. 13. In the preface to “Plastic Dynamism”, according to Antliff, how does
Boccioni call on the beholder to revolve around a sculpture and, at the same time, to "follow ideally" the development of a unique form of continuity in space? (p. 726)
Boccioni calls on the beholder to revolve around a sculpture and, at the same time, to “follow” ideally” the development of a unique form of continuity in space by instituting “pure plastic rhythm” in the guise of the “spiral architecture,” creating a continuity of forms for the beholder to follow ideally. 14. According to Antliff, in Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, how does the placement of the figure on cubic plinths create a dramatic contrast between "static" and "dynamic" forms? (p. 726)
In Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, the placement of the figure on cubic plinths creates a dramatic contrast between “static” and “dynamic” forms.
The cubic forms represent matter in a static state, whereas the dynamic body transforms itself into arabesque interplay or “force forms” or muscular movements. 15. According to Antliff, in the years immediately preceding the publication of the book Plastic Dynamism, how did Boccioni repeatedly affirm his own alliance with the Italian nationalist cause? (p. 727)
In the years immediately preceding the publication of the book Plastic Dynamism,
Boccioni repeatedly affirm his own alliance with the Italian nationalist cause by being on hand to applaud Marinetti’s synthesis of nationalism and syndicalism I the Futurist leader’s July 1910 lecture; in December 1912 he joined Marinetti in attending the first congress of Enrico Corradini’s Italian Nationalist Association held in Rome; and in May 1914 he reaffirmed that allegiance by attending another of Corradini’s congresses.
16. What means did Boccioni use to assimilate his theory of the fourth dimension into his political program? How does Antliff contextualize the
Futurists' political reading? (p. 727)
Boccioni used Bergsonian paradigms to assimilate his theory of the fourth dimension into his political program. Antliff contextualizes the Futurist’s political reading by considering the politics of Georges Sorel, a French theoretician who had a profound impact on the nationalism of Corradini and the Italian Futurists.
His innovation was to apply the Bergsonian duality between intellect and intuition in the sphere of leftist politics. Bergson limited his critique of intellectualism to the realm of metaphysics but Sorel claimed that the intellectual models of thought were at the root of French Republic’s parliamentary democracy.
17.
Which early Futurist works not only forged a similar rapprochement of nationalism and Sorelian violence, but also bear comparison to the themes developed in the syndicalist journal La Demolizione? (p. 728)
The two Futurists works ‘Revolt’ by Luigi Russolo and ‘Funeral of the Anarchist
Galli’ by Carlo Carra not only forged a similar rapprochement of nationalism and
Sorelian violence, but also bear comparison to the themes developed in the syndicalist journal La Demolizione.
18.According to Antiliff, in how does Carra’s Funeral of the Anarchist Galli
(1911) transcribe the proletarian battle into abstract pictorial form? (p. 730)
Carra’s ‘Funeral of the Anarchist Gallo (1911) transcribes the proletarian battle into abstract pictorial form by painting conveying the energy of the battle with “the sheaves of lines corresponding to all the conflicting forces, following the general laws of violence.” Carra’s “force lines” had a psychological effect on the viewer so that he or she is “obligated to struggle himself with the personages in the picture.”
19. According to Antliff, what did Boccioni's choice of the striding image of a heroic male for his Unique Forms of Continuity in Space may well have reflected? (p.
730)
According to Antliff, Boccioni’s choice of the striding image of a heroic male for his ‘Unique Forms of Continuity in Space’ may well have reflected a gendered notion of identification of the heroic male warrior as the primary force for social transformation. 20.In the conclusion, what does Antliff suggest Boccioni's fourth dimension would bring about? How was this designed to involve the spectator? (p.
731)
Antliff suggests Boccioni’s fourth dimension would bring about a national revolution with a Sorelian conflict between nations as its regenerative aim.
The force lines and force forms were designed to involve the spectator in the very politics that led to Italy’s intervention in WWI and, ultimately, to the rise of
Fascism in Italy.
Bulletin, Vol. 82, No. 4 (Dec. 2000), pp. 720-733.
1. What does Antliff explore, with respect to the Futurists' incorporation of aesthetic theories of time and space? Whose notions of temporality and intuitive consciousness does the author analyze? (p. 720)
Antliff explores the futurists’ incorporations of aesthetic theories of time and space into a utopian campaign to transform the consciousness of the Italian citizenry and inaugurate a political revolt against Italy’s democratic institutions.
The author analyzes the notions of temporality and intuitive consciousness of
Linda Henderson, which are derived from Henri Bergson.
2. According to Antliff, …show more content…
in contrast to other proponents of the fourth dimension, how did Boccioni assimilate spatial concepts into the Futurists' highly politicized campaign to renew Italy? What was the artist’s political program premised on and to what end? (pp. 720-721)
According to Antliff, in contrast to the proponents of the fourth dimension,
Boccioni assimilated spatial concepts into the Futurists’ high politicized campaign to renew Italy. The futurist correlation of the fourth dimension with a Bergsonian spatial-temporal flux made up of “force forms” and “force lines”, unfettered by the limitations of three-dimensional space or measured intuition and an anti- materialistic call for national regeneration and imperialist expansion. The artist’s political program was premised on the politics of Italian nationalism.
3. According to Antliff, whose notion of aestheticized politics does Futurist imagery thoroughly contradicts? Instead, what must any proper reading of their art take into account? (p. 721)
Futurist imagery thoroughly contradicts Walter Benjamin’s notion of aestheticized politics. Any proper reading of their art must take into account the anti- materialistic premises undergirding that disavowal, premises that Zeev Sternhell and Emilio Gentile have identified as fundamental to Italian proto-Fascism.
4. In Boccioni’s Plastic Dynamism, how do the Futurists experience intuition?
To what end? (p. 721)
In Boccioni’s Plastic Dynamism, the Futurists experience intuition by rejecting an art of “external appearances”, they are “living life in its dynamic conception”, and they enter an object’s “interior” and experience its living dynamism by intuition.
Only through intuition are the Futurists able to experience the “violent emotions of movement and speed” that “inspire new plastic ideas.”
5. Why did Boccioni claim Cubist and academic methods were indistinguishable? What was the effect of Picasso's "study of form"? (p.
721)
Boccioni claimed that Cubist and academic methods were indistinguishable because of their shared reliance on “intellectual” and “scientific” techniques that left the artist (and beholder) external to the object itself. The effect of
Picasso’s “study of form” was that the analysis of the object was always at the expense of the object.
6. On what basis does Antliff suggest virtually every aspect of Boccioni's critique had its roots in Bergson's metaphysics? (p. 722)
Antliff suggests virtually that every aspect of Boccioni’s critique had its roots in
Bergson’s metaphysics on the basis that Bergson identifies relative knowledge with all forms of “analysis” utilized in “positive science”; absolute knowledge, “can only be given in an intuition” because intuition is the “sympathy by which one is transported into the interior of an object in order to coincide with what there is unique” about it. To Boccioni, the Futurist intuition of an object’s interior dynamism then is a form of “absolute” knowledge, whereas the analytic methods developed by other movements relegated them to “relative” knowledge.
7. What does Bergson claim in Creative Evolution with regard to the artist’s ability to potentially possess intuitive vision? (p. 722)
In Creative Evolution, Bergson claimed with regard to the artist’s ability to potentially possess intuitive vision that if “our faulty of seeing should be made one with the act of willing,” our vision would overcome its utilitarian function and, through an effort of intuition, discern the melody of inner duration.
8. According to Boccioni, what did the Cubists do to form? As a result, what did Cubist technique condemn the artist to do? (p. 722)
According to Boccioni, the Cubists divided a singular form into its component parts and juxtaposed these parts across the surface of a canvas, to reveal “the planes of the object that its accidental position prevents us from seeing.” As a result, the Cubist technique condemns the artists to circle endlessly around an object in order to analyze its external appearances. Unable to perceive duration, the Cubist was restricted to the realm of the relative, unable to reach the “intuitive absolute.” 9. How did Boccioni introduce the Futurist concept of the “fourth dimension”
with his own Bergsonian conception of that idea, by contrasting it to the
Cubists' "false claim" to the term? (pp. 722-723)
Boccioni introduced the Futurist concept of the “fourth dimension” with his own
Bergsonian conception of that idea, by contrasting it to the Cubists’ “false claim” to the term by asserting that the Cubists utilized a “measured and finite fourth dimension” to transcribe their “rotating point of view” around an object onto a canvas, whereas the Futurists fourth dimension was “a continuous projection of forces and forms intuited in their infinite unfolding.”
10. According to Antliff, what did the fourth dimension constitute to Boccioni?
How did Boccioni seek to grasp it? (p. 723)
According to Antliff, to Boccioni the fourth dimension constituted of the unfolding of temporality into space in the guise of “forces or directions,” and it is an intuition of these “force forms” that produces the “lyrical deformations” of his art.
Boccioni grasps it by the distinction between “spatial” and “temporal knowledge,”
Boccioni’s awareness of Bergson’s definition of “extensity” as an intuitive notion of space.
11. Rather than retrospectively analyzing motion as a trajectory between two points, how did the Futurists experience motion? (p. 724)
The Futurists experienced motion as the mental and material unfolding of a creative act.
12. How does Boccioni define dynamism? (p. 724)
Boccioni defines dynamism as the synthesis of relative and absolute motion, as an evolutionary concept of plastic reality, the form-type, the form of forms, the continuity. 13. In the preface to “Plastic Dynamism”, according to Antliff, how does
Boccioni call on the beholder to revolve around a sculpture and, at the same time, to "follow ideally" the development of a unique form of continuity in space? (p. 726)
Boccioni calls on the beholder to revolve around a sculpture and, at the same time, to “follow” ideally” the development of a unique form of continuity in space by instituting “pure plastic rhythm” in the guise of the “spiral architecture,” creating a continuity of forms for the beholder to follow ideally. 14. According to Antliff, in Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, how does the placement of the figure on cubic plinths create a dramatic contrast between "static" and "dynamic" forms? (p. 726)
In Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, the placement of the figure on cubic plinths creates a dramatic contrast between “static” and “dynamic” forms.
The cubic forms represent matter in a static state, whereas the dynamic body transforms itself into arabesque interplay or “force forms” or muscular movements. 15. According to Antliff, in the years immediately preceding the publication of the book Plastic Dynamism, how did Boccioni repeatedly affirm his own alliance with the Italian nationalist cause? (p. 727)
In the years immediately preceding the publication of the book Plastic Dynamism,
Boccioni repeatedly affirm his own alliance with the Italian nationalist cause by being on hand to applaud Marinetti’s synthesis of nationalism and syndicalism I the Futurist leader’s July 1910 lecture; in December 1912 he joined Marinetti in attending the first congress of Enrico Corradini’s Italian Nationalist Association held in Rome; and in May 1914 he reaffirmed that allegiance by attending another of Corradini’s congresses.
16. What means did Boccioni use to assimilate his theory of the fourth dimension into his political program? How does Antliff contextualize the
Futurists' political reading? (p. 727)
Boccioni used Bergsonian paradigms to assimilate his theory of the fourth dimension into his political program. Antliff contextualizes the Futurist’s political reading by considering the politics of Georges Sorel, a French theoretician who had a profound impact on the nationalism of Corradini and the Italian Futurists.
His innovation was to apply the Bergsonian duality between intellect and intuition in the sphere of leftist politics. Bergson limited his critique of intellectualism to the realm of metaphysics but Sorel claimed that the intellectual models of thought were at the root of French Republic’s parliamentary democracy.
17.
Which early Futurist works not only forged a similar rapprochement of nationalism and Sorelian violence, but also bear comparison to the themes developed in the syndicalist journal La Demolizione? (p. 728)
The two Futurists works ‘Revolt’ by Luigi Russolo and ‘Funeral of the Anarchist
Galli’ by Carlo Carra not only forged a similar rapprochement of nationalism and
Sorelian violence, but also bear comparison to the themes developed in the syndicalist journal La Demolizione.
18.According to Antiliff, in how does Carra’s Funeral of the Anarchist Galli
(1911) transcribe the proletarian battle into abstract pictorial form? (p. 730)
Carra’s ‘Funeral of the Anarchist Gallo (1911) transcribes the proletarian battle into abstract pictorial form by painting conveying the energy of the battle with “the sheaves of lines corresponding to all the conflicting forces, following the general laws of violence.” Carra’s “force lines” had a psychological effect on the viewer so that he or she is “obligated to struggle himself with the personages in the picture.”
19. According to Antliff, what did Boccioni's choice of the striding image of a heroic male for his Unique Forms of Continuity in Space may well have reflected? (p.
730)
According to Antliff, Boccioni’s choice of the striding image of a heroic male for his ‘Unique Forms of Continuity in Space’ may well have reflected a gendered notion of identification of the heroic male warrior as the primary force for social transformation. 20.In the conclusion, what does Antliff suggest Boccioni's fourth dimension would bring about? How was this designed to involve the spectator? (p.
731)
Antliff suggests Boccioni’s fourth dimension would bring about a national revolution with a Sorelian conflict between nations as its regenerative aim.
The force lines and force forms were designed to involve the spectator in the very politics that led to Italy’s intervention in WWI and, ultimately, to the rise of
Fascism in Italy.