Italian Futurism – Boccioni

When I visited the Palazzo Reale di Milano in June 2013, I saw several Picasso and Braque cubist paintings that displayed the signature edgy and dimensional look that Cubism is known to exhibit. Some of the Picasso and Braque pieces were actually difficult to tell apart because of their similar look and use of natural muddy tones. In contrast to these more dull color schemes though, displayed close by, were the works of the Italian futurist painter, Umberto Boccioni. Two of the paintings I snapped a quick photo of, were his Studio-di-testa, La Madre (Study of a head, Mother) and Donna al caffè : Compenetrations di luci e Planes (Woman in a Café: Compenetrations of Lights and Planes). Futurism, being an analytical branch of Cubism, means that paintings were drawn from real life models or observations. The basic shapes, colors, and interpretations of Futurist paintings are created from taking real life subjects and finding their core forms and tones, usually resulting in very geometric and monochromatic paintings. These two particular paintings by Boccioni are actually much more colorful than most Futurist works, both incorporating more colors than the usual monochromatic color schemes seen in this movement. In Study of a Head, Mother the colors are not extremely saturated, but that may just be because of the faded canvas background. However, the use of color on the face is much warmer and realistic than the colors in those in his Woman in a Café. Study of a Head, Mother is no doubt categorized as an analytic Futurist painting because of it’s simplified forms of the cheeks, eyes, hair, and body of this elder woman, but I must say that the colors most definitely seem more realistic than most other futurist paintings. The face is warm and bright, like skin, and though the hair and body are darker and blue, their tones give a realistic contrast to the skin tone. The woman herself also has emotion in her face and posture that is much more readable than the other Futurist paintings of the time which exhibit less emotion, and more focus on movement, and basic shape. The Woman in a Café: Compenetrations of Lights and Planes, on the other hand, is a more mainstream example of Futurism. It’s less realistic color scheme and strong feeling of movement are more established in the Futurism movement overall. Though after reading the name of this piece, one may be able to make out the face of a woman, and maybe even a coffee table (and sugar cube tray?) it is much more difficult to make out what these shapes represent, and the overall movement, aura, and mood of this piece are more evident. That being said, seen from an analytical viewpoint, this painting makes much more sense, for Analytical Futurism was also known to focus on examining something in its entirety, not just as it looks like in real life. In this way, once knowing the name of this piece, one can feel more of an overall essence of this woman in this place and time. Boccioni’s futurist works are extremely interesting in that they exhibit two very different approaches to the movement, both created within (at most) two years of one another.

Studio-di-testa, La Madre (Study of a head, Mother), 1912 and Donna al caffè : Compenetrations di luci e Planes (Woman in a Café: Compenetrations of Lights and Planes),1912-1914. Museo Civico di Arte Contemporanea, Palazzo Reale, Milan. Photo by Hailey Thomson

Umberto Boccioni. Study of a Head, Mother. Image found on WikiArt.org

Umberto Boccioni. Woman in a Café: Compenetrations of Lights and Planes. Image found on WikiArt.Org

Italian Expressionist / Post-Impressionism inspired Painter – Francesco Menzio

When in Italy in the summer of 2013, I saw many expressionist, impressionist, cubist, and futurist paintings throughout several modern art museums. Though all of these movements took place throughout the same two to three decades, they have differences that are sometimes hard to decipher unless you know some history on the particular movement, painting or artist. Through looking back on some of the photos I took while abroad, I found several paintings that were done in the early 1900’s, yet they mimicked some post-impressionism qualities.

A painting done by Francesco Menzio, titled “Ritratto in Bleu” (Portrait in Blue), was sitting among some surrealist, cubism, and futurism paintings. What I found most interesting about this painting in regards to it’s time period, is how much transition it reflects. It undoubtably displays impressionist qualities such as the brush strokes, and use of color with the blue shadows, and minimal color mixing, and it gives a strong emphasis on mood rather than subject matter. The colors are very cold and bright, yet the facial features, body, hat, vase, and table are not exceptionally detailed. When the war ended in 1918, there was a “Return to Order” movement, which was a time after the war when surrealism and futurism was rejected, and returning to traditional styles was favored. However, many artists (and especially Menzio who was just getting started in his painting career post-war), were still transitioning between post-impression and fauvism where new uses of color and light were being explored, but the impressionist strokes were still embraced and the desire to put a certain respect and importance on artist expression was highly sought after.

Francesco Menzio was an Italian artist who’s paintings were deeply influenced by both post-impressionism and the impressionist painters before him, after he came back to Turin from Paris in 1928. He was born in 1899 in Sardinia, an island off the west coast of Italy, from a Piedmontese family. He moved to Turin with his family at the age of 13. After the first world war (which he was in), he began his painting career. He visited Felics Casorati’s gallery often, who was a prominently realist painter, but he lived in Paris for some time in his life as well, where he met and continued to be influenced by some Impressionist painters. Menzio changed from a more traditional style to a more expressive one when he, along with several other artists who had interest in french painting, formed the Gruppo di Sei (Group of Six) in 1928. These six artists felt that “intellectual freedom against the dictatorship” was of the utmost importance when it came to art, along with it being “a way to express critic and ethic autonomy.” (MAG Como, Francesco Menzio Biography).

Citation:

http://salvatoremarsiglione.wix.com/magcomo#!biography-francesco-menzio/ca6l

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francesco_Menzio

Ritratto in bleu. (Portrait in Blue.) 1929. Milan Museo del Novecento. Photo by Hailey Thomson

Ritratto in bleu. (Portrait in Blue.) 1929. Milan Museo del Novecento.
Photo By jean louis mazieres via http://saveflickr.com/

Design Systems Thinking Post 2

Noble and Bestley’s introduction to design research methodologies was an interesting read in which the process for designing something that visually communicates a message, is put into a step by step ideation of how to go about finding and creating the most successful final piece. The first instinct for most designers or people in general, is to eliminate and find the exact end result ideas as soon as possible. However, in a successful process, the practical problem that is trying to be solved needs to be thought of in a broader sense. Once the problem/idea is addressed, you can then generate research questions, which will define the research methodology to find the research outcome, which then solves the original problem. Through this cycle of research, relating the content to competing messages is important so that if there is a visual language that has already been created for your particular audience it can either be followed or recognized so that a new visual language is created. Cost and time restrictions are also an important aspect to look at before hand, and this may play a part in the scheduling for experimentation. This brings us to the section on experimentation and how to go about investigating. Context-definition is a model that purely investigates a field of study, where as context-experiement starts with investigating a field, but then uses experimentation to take the redefinition of a project into a more particular focus, sooner. Both of these methods should help find the visual route and end product which is most “effective, useful or engaging” for the purpose. To do this, social analysis’ (whether they are measured by criteria/ positive and negative number results or the designer using critical self-reflection), is critical.

What interested me at the end of this reading, was the section on mind mapping and the case study reflection titled “I love you.” When addressing an audience of any kind, no matter what the research guides you toward specifically, there is an embedded aspect of human kind that responds to the way maps convey direction and sense-making, and the way symbols create different visual meanings based on their shape, color, size, etc. These visual variables studied by designers, are what create a successful visual communication, if done correctly. The research is at the core, and the background is what develops these visual outcomes, but in the end, basic human understanding of symbolism and mapping is how the project’s successful execution is created.

Noble, Ian, and Russell Bestley. “Methods.” Visual Research: An Introduction to Research Methodologies in Graphic Design. Lausanne: AVA, 2005. N. pag. Print.

Interesting way to use both symbols and mapping to show the creative process.

Italian Neoclassicism

Neoclassicism is one of the first movements in modern art, and stemming from the french revolution, it greatly reflects the style of classical paintings. However, most neoclassical art is so heavily influenced by this style, because during this time period, human kind was being re-looked at as sinful and much less perfect than previously. Therefor, highly influenced by the writings of Johann Joachim Winckelmann, imitating the extrordinary, perfect, and historical classicism was the only way to “become great” again.Two years ago, I spent the summer in Turin (or Torino), Italy where I took a Modern and Contemporary art class. I traveled to museums in Milan, Florence, and Rome. Because Italy is so well known for its older art, it was interesting to compare the classical art of the 14th to 17th centuries to the re-evaluations of them in the neoclassical art of the late 17th and early 18th century. A museum I visited several times in Torino, called the Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea held a lot of modern art pieces, and notably some of the work of Giovanni Fattori. However, most of the work featured during the time I was there, included the later modern movements. It was not until I did a little more research and looked back through my pictures from the museum trips, that I was able to find an example of the neoclassical sculpture I had remembered most, which was created by an Italian artist. Antonia Canova’s Saffo (Erma di Saffo), which means Herma of  Sappho, is a bust sculpture made of marble, of the Ancient Greek lyrical poet, Sappho. Though this sculpture was made in the early 19th century, it has an undeniable classical perfection influence. Sappho was known to write poetry obtaining to love by both genders, and was born on the island of Lesbos, known to be where the word Lesbian stemmed from. Sculptures and Hermas like this one, were created in the fourth and fifth centuries BC. When in Italy I visited the Vatican, Uffizi Gallery, and other museums where classical greek sculptures (or roman copies of them) were prominent throughout. To see a reinterpretation of there style, which looked so much more clean, crisp, and yet delicate gave a sense of what the marble used for the greek and roman classical sculptures looked like long ago. However, a notable difference I saw in Canova’s Saffo when compared to the classical influences, was the simplicity and calm look on her face. The perfection and essence of beauty is deeply rooted in the classical greek influence that neoclassicism was known for, but the innocent, pure, light, and airy look about Saffo shows less bold-ness than it’s past influences. Canova was known for his light and airy look about his sculpture, which carries even into one of his most famous works, Perseus with the Head of Medusa, which is at the Vatican. Even this piece, which represents a famous slaughter in Greek mythology, a heroic and elegant take is shown in his reworking of this historical and repeated sculpture.

Sappho by Antonio Canova at GAM Torino. Photo by Hailey Thomson

Sappho by Antonio Canova at GAM Torino. Photo by Hailey Thomson

Sappho by Antonio Canova at GAM Torino. Photo by Hailey Thomson

“Perseus Canova Pio-Clementino Inv969” by Antonio Canova – Marie-Lan Nguyen (2009). Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons – http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Perseus_Canova_Pio-Clementino_Inv969.jpg#/media/File:Perseus_Canova_Pio-Clementino_Inv969.jpg

Design Systems Thinking Post 1

After reading Brown and Wyatt’s Design Thinking for Social Innovation, I quickly connected this idea of thinking through the user’s actual needs first, as a similar process to what I have been using to come to the final ideation of the last few projects I have worked on in class. Whether it is information design, an app, or some sort of program used for people to obtain clean water in a foreign country, thinking about the process of the user is a vital aspect. It is easy for designers to jump into not only visual aspects of a design or product, but even the overall idea because of assumptions and habit. However, once the users process is taken into consideration, this is when the product obtains it’s highest amount of usage. This article and its explanation of the “design thinking” process, is reflected currently in a program my classmates and I are testing out for our capstone class. Helium, which is currently in beta, is a program that allows professionals and students alike to make decisions and have conversations based off of poles, ideas, collaborations, and charts, all in one place. Though I have not used it extensively, our class is currently testing it for a project. As the “users” in Artefact’s design thinking process, we are responsible for sending our feedback of this product in order to improve it’s user experience. Our feedback is a direct reflection of how design thinking, even in the prototype stage, leaves room for constant improvement and consideration of the user. Good products, no matter how beautiful they look, only truly last if the user is able to seamlessly use them in a productive and uninterrupted manner. IDEO, who created this “design thinking” process explains this method as something which is “about empathy for people and for disciplines beyond one’s own. It tends to be expressed as openness, curiosity, optimism, a tendency toward learning through doing, and experimentation.” (Design Thinking For Social Innovation, 34).

This informational design piece below, by Curiousity Design Research, though not completely parallel with the steps described in IDEO’s Human Centered Design Toolkit, allows us to quickly grasp this detailed and thoughtful mechanism of design.

Brown, Tim, and Jocelynn Wyatt. “Design Thinking For Social Innovation.” Stanford Social Innovation Review (2010): 31-35. Print.