Books and Graphics in the Time of Futurism
Abstract:
This essay summarizes the main features of Futurist books, by accounting for
their complex originality. Since the early stages of their careers, Futurists
employed books as a privileged means of experimentation both in terms of
graphics and contents. Authors like Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Francesco
Cangiullo, Carlo Carrà, Fortunato Depero and Ardengo Soffici explored
the visual, graphic and onomatopoeic possibilities of written words in parolibere. These authors put into
practice a typographic revolution, which aimed to subvert the usual order
within a page, through the use of different characters and colours. In
particular, Marinetti announced the birth of this peculiar expressive form in
his manifests and set the grounds for a renewal of written expression.
When the Futurist manifesto is published on 20th
February
La
letteratura esaltòfino ad oggi l’immobilità pensosa, l’estasi e
il sonno. Noi vogliamo esaltare il movimento aggressivo, l’insonnia febbrile,
il passo di corsa, il salto mortale, lo schiaffo ed il pugno[1].
This text even invites to physically demolish the
places where this tradition was usually appointed:
Noi
vogliamo distruggere i musei, le biblioteche, le accademie d’ogni specie, e
combattere contro il moralismo, il femminismo e contro ogni viltà
opportunistica o utilitaria[2].
Marinetti’s outburst is focused on enhancing force and
dinamism:
Noi
vogliamo cantare l’amore del pericolo, l’abitudine all’energia e alla
temerarietà...il coraggio, l’audacia, la ribellione, saranno elementi
essenziali della nostra poesia[3].
The methods chosen to transmit this message to the
world are writing, a powerful tool of persuasion, and printing, an effective
system of diffusion. Therefore, the Futurist Manifesto employs strategies,
which remind us more of communication than of art. Thus, Futurists print many
copies of their propaganda papers and publish them in newspapers and reviews,
they distribute them on the streets, or they even drop them from airplanes on
towns. These texts – with the exception of the first manifesto, which is
influenced by the symbolist tradition - are essential, synthetic, direct, clear
and show a determinate intention to experiment in writing.
The topics of these papers do
not only concern art (literature, paintings, music, cinema, sculpture,
architecture, photography and theatre), but also everyday life and costume. Moreover,
they innovate the style of texts, by justifying their choices with precise
theoretical references. In Manifesto
tecnico della letteratura futurista[4], which concerns in particular the poetical
inspiration, Marinetti describes how to overwhelm free verse: he encourages to
destroy the syntax and to abolish the adjective, the adverb, the conjunctions
and the punctuation, by using verbs in the infinitive form and of nouns, which
have to be connected by analogy.
Marinetti explains how these
rules shoud be applied by referring to his poem La battaglia di
In 1909, he publishes Gian
Pietro Lucini’s Revolverate, by substituting the less
effective original title Canzoni amare. A year later he publishes Aldo Palazzeschi’s L’Incendiario, which he introduces with
a report on the first Futurist evening in
Abolire
anche la punteggiatura. Essendo soppressi gli aggettivi, gli avverbi e le
congiunzioni, la punteggiatura è naturalmente annullata, nella
continuità varia di uno stile vivo, che si crea da sé, senza le soste
assurde delle virgole e dei punti. Per accentuare certi movimenti e indicare le
loro direzioni, s’impiegheranno i segni della matematica: +--x: = ><, e i
segni musicali[7].
For the first time Marinetti
writes this text entirely in Italian rather than in French. This text is
constructed by an accumulation of images, which are evoked through a quick
succession of nouns and verbs in the infinitive, and might be considered
precisely as the conjunction between the free verse and the subsequent “parole
in libertà”. Marinetti gives further
indications concerning the way in which this new composition form should be put
into practice in another manifest: L’immaginazione senza fili e
le parole in libertà.
in which celebrates a proper typographic revolution:
Io
inizio una rivoluzione tipografica diretta contro la bestiale e nauseante
concezione del libro di versi passatista e dannunziana[8].
The rules of symmetry and
harmony of the page should be subverted systematically by employing different typographic
characters and colours, capitals together with small letters, bold, italics,
creative spaces between words and unusual disposition of the words within the
page. Onomatopoeia plays a central role in this text, since
it aims at introducing elements of real life within the writing, by argumenting
the evocative possibilities of the writing:
Noi
futuristi iniziamo l’uso audace e continuo dell’onomatopea...allo scopo di dare
la massima quantità di vibrazioni e una piú profonda sintesi
della vita, noi aboliamo tutti i legami stilistici, tutte le lucide fibbie
colle quali i poeti tradizionali legano le immagini nel loro periodare[9].
This trait is also evident in
the title of Marinetti’s first collection of parolibere Zang Tumb Tuuum(1914).
image 1a: FilippoTommaso
Marinetti, Zang Tumb Tuuum, Adrianopoli ottobre, 1912. Parole in libertà, Edizioni futuriste di “Poesia”,
Milano 1914 Brescia, Collection Longo-Albertini)
This volume collects many
poems previously published between 1912 and
image 1b:
FilippoTommaso Marinetti, Zang Tumb Tuuum, Adrianopoli
ottobre, 1912.
Parole in libertà,
Edizioni futuriste di “Poesia”, Milano 1914, pp. 120-121 Brescia,
Collection Longo-Albertini
Although Marinetti was present at this event as
correspondent for the French newspaper “Gil Blas”, he chooses to use an
impersonal writing, by putting into practice the disappearance of the narrating
self, which he theorises in the Manifesto
tecnico della letteratura futurista:
Distruggere
nella letteratura l’io, cioè tutta la psicologia. L’uomo completamente
avariato dalla biblioteca e dal museo, sottoposto a una logica e ad una
saggezza spaventose, non offre assolutamente più interesse alcuno.
Dunque, dobbiamo abolirlo nella letteratura, e sostituirlo finalmente colla
materia, di cui si deve afferrare l’essenza a colpi d’intuizione, la qual cosa
non potranno mai fare i fisici né i chimici[10].
Marinetti describes a
collective action, which takes place simultaneously and therefore cannot be
contained in a rigid narrative structure, which is organised chronologically.
The unusual graphic composition of this text is aimed to surprise the reader:
the graphic, visual and phonetic connotation of words is as important as their
meaning. In addition, words are repeated, transformed, isolated or reduced to
single letters. The linear progression of reading from left to right is
disrupted, by inviting the reader to let his gaze move freely within the page.
Thanks to this uncommon disposition, Marinetti’s literary works borders on
figurative art. He creates a subtle equilibrium between typographic characters
and blanks, which transforms them into a structural element of the composition
and emphasises the dense materiality of words. Blanks do not only stand for
silences, but also introduce spatial and temporal elements such as pauses. In
other terms, they substitute punctuation, which futurist poetry deeply ostracized.
This original disposition and
choice of fonts is very revolutionary for this epoch even from a technical
point of view, if one thinks about the machinery and printing processes
available at the time. The realization of this first parolibero text is made possible, as stated at the end of Zang Tumb Tuuum, thanks to the ability
and creativeness of the Milanese typographer Cesare Cavanna, a loyal
collaborator of the Futurists, thanks to whom numerous other parolibero volumes are published.
Thanks to the organization
of words within the page and to the frequent use of onomatopoeias, parolibere
might likely be read aloud, as if they were music scores, which have to be
declaimed rather than played. As
the manifesto La declamazione dinamica e sinottica maintains, the
interpreter of parolibere should depersonalise his voice and
movements, in order to employ a “geometrical” and dynamic gesticulation as
indicated in the manifest La declamazione
dinamica e sinottica:
Disumanizzare
completamente la voce, togliendole sistematicamente ogni modulazione o
sfumatura...Disumanizzare completamente la faccia, evitare ogni smorfia, ogni
effetto d’occhi...Metallizzare, liquefare, vegetalizzare, pietrificare ed
elettrizzare la voce, fondendola colle vibrazioni stesse della materia,
espresse dalle parole in libertà... Avere una gesticolazione geometrica,
dando così alle braccia delle rigidità taglienti di semafori e di
raggi di fari per indicare le direzioni delle forze, o di stantuffi e di ruote,
per esprimere il dinamismo delle parole in libertà[11].
Nonetheless, the vocal and
musical elements should be subordinated to the visual signs. In this regard, as
suggested in Marinetti’s third manifest Lo splendoregeometrico e meccanico e la
sensibilitànumerica, which is dedicated in particular to
writing,maintains that words should be reduced to a simple graphic sign. In
other terms, Marinetti believes that the meaning of words is less important
than their immediate forms as images.
Many futurist poets followed
Marinetti’s principles and instructions. For instance, Luciano Folgore
publishes Ponti
sull’oceano in the same year as Zang Tumb Tuuum. This
volume exemplifies his “synthetic lyricism” a sort of compromise between
parolibere and compositions in free verses
which he theorised in an eponymous manifest. Folgore employs
typographical artifice, but does not radically disrupt the rules of syntax. On the cover of Ponti sull’oceano, designed by the architect Antonio Sant’Elia, the title creates the shape of a
bridge. This book is promoted by the Edizionifuturiste di “Poesia”, which also
printed the most remarkable publications of this kind, such as Paolo Buzzi’s L’ellisse e la spirale (Film + Parole in
libertà, Auro
D’Alba’s Baionette, Corrado Govoni’s Rarefazioni (including his famous Autoritratto)
and Francesco Cangiullo’s Piedigrotta recited in two futurist
evenings.
image
2: Francesco Cangiullo, Piedigrotta, Edizioni
futuriste di “Poesia”, Milano 1916 Torino, Collection Alessandro Dorna
In this period, experimentations
with words are also performed on canvas. Between 1911 and 1912, many futurist
painters started to introduce alphabetic signs in their paintings by composing
papierscollés with press cuttings assembled on the painted surface.
Through the collage technique, the audacious lettering of parolibere is associated with images, both painted or
graphically inserted, which are connected to the main themes of the movement
such as speed, modernity and war. For instance, Carlo Carrà creates
examples of “poems-painting”; Marinetti attempts to conjugate plastic dynamism
and “parole in libertà” in his “Parolibere drawing”; Gino Severini talks
of “painted literature”. These artists also compose paroliberi books. In Carrà’s Guerrapittura, reproductions of works, theoretical
essays and typographic experimentations are assembled together. Similarly, Ardengo Soffici’s Bïf§Zf+18 24 looks
like a newspaper and has a wonderful cover with colours, which is composed by using
the technique of collage. The painter, scenographer, advertiser and designer
FortunatoDepero contributes to the research on the visual possibilities of
printing in his “Libro imbullonato”, which he composed in order to celebrate
his fourteenth year of militancy in the futurist movement.
image 3: Fortunato Depero, Depero futurista, Dinamo Azari, Milano 1927
Torino, Collection Alessandro Dorna
At a first glance, this volume
is surprising for his outstretched shape and the thickness of the pages. These
features, together with the binding made with aluminium bolts ideated by Dinamo
Azari, provide this volume with a massive appearance. “Libroimbullonato”
contains many parolibere, printed on different colours and weights, along with
reproductions of paintings, arrases, drawings and projects, which are aimed at
advertising Depero’s work and that of the publishing house Azari. As the case
of “Libro imbullonato” clearly shows, the research on the field of editorial
graphics by futurists is particularly creative not merely in the poetic
expression throughparolibere but also in the format of their books as
well as in their covers and illustrations.
The
literary production of this movement is not limited to poetry but it is also
very prolific in prose, since futurists published texts as diverse as theatre
plays, essays, recipe books and different novels, which ranged across a large
variety of popular themes (love stories, science-fiction novels, war stories,
detective stories). Like in parolibere books, in these novels the style is as
important as the content and the aesthetic appearance of the volume, including
the layout and the decorations. Sometimes the author draws his own cover. For
instance, Alfredo Trimarco covers his book Alta Velocità with silver paper, a colour that evokes the
metal surface of cars and airplanes. Frequently, futurist artists address other
members of the movement. For example, Francesco Balilla Pratella asked
Umberto Boccioni to compose a board for Musica futurista. Similarly,
Bruno Munari contributed to Pino Masnata’s Anime
sceneggiate.
Futurists
carefully selected the packaging of their editorial products. This feature is
much in line with the assumptions of Giacomo Balla e Fortunato Depero’s
manifesto La ricostruzione futurista dell’universo: futurism did not only aim at exploiting the
potentialities of visual and written communication, but also to permeate every
aspect of human life. The results of this ceaseless research on books will have
a determinant influence on the graphics between the two wars in
Acknowledgements:
The
paper was translated from Italian to English by Simone Brioni. Special
thanks to Maria and Rosanna Francescotti.
[1]Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, “Manifesto del futurismo”, Le Figaro, 20 febbraio 1909, p. 1
[2]Ibid..
[3]Ibid..
[4]Marinetti publishes this manifesto for the first time
as a leafleft on May 11, 1912.
[5]L. Altomare, Mario Bètuda, Paolo Buzzi, I poeti futuristi, Milano: Edizioni futuriste di “Poesia”, 1912.
[6]This volume contains the second edition of the manifesto: Supplemento al Manifesto tecnico della letteratura futurista, dal titolo Risposte alle obiezioni, August 11, 1912
[7]Manifesto tecnico della letteratura futurista
[8]Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Immaginazione senza fili e parole in libertà, Milano: Direzione del Movimento Futurista, 1913.
[9]Ibid..
[10] Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Manifesto tecnico della letteratura futurista, Milano: Direzione del Movimento Futurista, 11 maggio 1912
[11]Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, La declamazione dinamica e sinottica, Milano: Direzione del Movimento Futurista, 1916.
Melania Gazzotti (Brescia, 1976) is a freelance art curator and an art historian. Since 2004 she has been collaborating with the Mart – the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Trento and Rovereto. She is interested in artist's books and in the relationship between art and written language. She organized the exhibitions “Libri taglienti, esplosivi e luminosi. Avanguardie artistiche e libro tra Futurismo e libro d’artista” (Trento, Bolzano 2004, in collaboration with Museion, the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Bolzano), "Verba Manent" (Trento, 2005), "La Parola nell'arte. Ricerche d’avanguardia nel ‘900. Dal Futurismo ad oggi attraverso le collezioni del Mart" (MART, Rovereto, 2007), "Primo amore. La passione di un collezionista. 100 Libri d'artista. The passion of a collector 100 artists' books" and "Books. Libri d'artista dagli anni Sessanta ad oggi – Books. Artists' books from the sixties to the present day" (Bologna 2006 and 2008 in collaboration with the Artelibro Festival, Bologna). Melania Gazzotti’s work also focuses on historical avant-gardes. On this topic, she organized the exhibitions "Bulloni, grazie e bastoni. Il libro futurista" (Cagliari, Brescia, Reggio Calabria, 2009) and "Dada e futurismo. Da Marinetti a Tzara. Da Mantova all'Europa nel segno dell'avanguardia" (Mantova, 2009).