POST #14 – LECTURE – FUTURISM - FLUXUS

Summary

Modern art went through major changes with movements like Futurism, led by Marinetti and later connected to Mussolini. Artists such as Boccioni and Giacomo Balla explored motion, while Russolo created the Intonarumori to bring industrial noise into music. In Russia, Rayonnism used rays of light to show energy and a 4th dimension, while Suprematism, led by Malevich, focused on pure feeling and Non-Objective Art, shown in art like the Black Square. Constructivism, started by Vladimir Tatlin and seen in designs like Tatlin Tower, used industrial materials and treated the artist as an engineer. Naum Gabo expanded this with kinetic sculpture. The Bauhaus, founded by Walter Gropius, blended art, craft, and design, emphasizing functionality and simplicity. At the same time, Dada emerged at Cabaret Voltaire with people like Hugo Ball, Tristan Tzara, and artists like Hans Arp, using chance, and Raoul Hausmann, specalizing in collage. Marcel Duchamp challenged tradition by using readymades like Fountain, rejecting “retinal art,” and promoting “art for the mind,” These ideas would lead to Conceptual Art, Surrealism, and eventually Postmodernism, with its focus on appropriation, Pop Art, like Andy Warhol's work, Rauschenberg’s Combine works, Fluxus, and forms of ephemeral art.

Reflection

Looking at these movements shows how artists challenged the past and expanded what art could be. Futurism pushed modern speed and technology, while Dada responded to war with absurdity and humor. Suprematism and Constructivism questioned whether art should be spiritual, abstract, or practical and industrial. The Bauhaus made art more connected to everyday objects, and Duchamp’s readymades helped shift art toward ideas rather than beauty. Later movements like Fluxus, Conceptual Art, Pop Art, and Postmodernism continued to break rules through appropriation, process, chance, and performance. Together, these movements show a shift toward experimentation, new materials, and the belief that art can be anything as long as it makes people think.