Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson (British, 1889–1946)

Returning to the Trenches, 1914-15

Nevinson’s early work during the war is typical of Futurist attitude to conflict: the movement, primarily made up of Italians, (Nevinson was one of the only British artists involved), strongly supported and promoted war as a form of status, power and positive human development. Nevinson’s later war work became much more emotionally charged and sympathetic towards wounded soldiers in undesirable hospital conditions.

The First Searchlights at Charing Cross, 1914

Flooded Trench on the Yser, 1916

Torcello, Venice

Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson (1889–1946) was an English figure and landscape painter, etcher, and lithographer. He gained prominence as one of the most famous war artists during World War I. Often referred to by his initials C. R. W. Nevinson, he was also known as Richard.

• Early Life: Nevinson was born in London on August 13, 1889. His parents were the journalist and war correspondent Henry Nevinson and the writer Margaret Nevinson, a staunch advocate for women’s suffrage. He attended the Slade School of Fine Art at the University College London, where he studied alongside notable artists like Mark Gertler, Stanley Spencer, Paul Nash, and Dora Carrington.

• Artistic Influences: Nevinson was deeply impressed by the work of Welsh artist Augustus John. His artistic journey led him to Paris, where he encountered Italian painters Amedeo Modigliani and Gino Severini. He also explored cubism through the influence of Pablo Picasso.

• War Art: When World War I erupted, Nevinson, a committed pacifist and conscientious objector, initially refused to enlist. However, he eventually joined the Royal Army Medical Corps and served as an ambulance driver. His war experiences profoundly influenced his art. Nevinson’s war paintings, such as “A Group of Soldiers” (1917), captured the grim realities of the conflict.

• Futurism and Conflict: Nevinson’s involvement with the futurist movement led to clashes with other artists. He co-authored the manifesto “Vital English Art” with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, championing futurism as the true avant-garde movement. This stance caused tensions with fellow artists, including Wyndham Lewis.

• Legacy: Nevinson’s powerful war imagery remains iconic. His use of angular lines and dynamic compositions conveyed the chaos and brutality of battle. Beyond war art, he also produced landscapes, portraits, and cityscapes. His legacy endures as a testament to the impact of war on artistic expression.

For more information, you can explore Nevinson’s works at the Tate or view his lithography collection on WikiArt

Gino Severini, Sea Dancer

 Gino Severini (Italian, Cubism Futurism, 1883-1966)

Sea Dancer, 1914

 Expansion sphérique de la lumière centripète et centrifuge.

Simultanéisme (1913-1914)

Autoritratto (1912-13)

The Society Violinist, 1915

Dancer (1915), Oil on canvas

Maternità, 1916

Paesaggio francese

Gino Severini

Gino Severini (7 April 1883 – 26 February 1966) was an Italian painter and a leading member of the Futurist movement. For much of his life he divided his time between Paris and Rome. He was associated with neo-classicism and the "return to order" in the decade after the First World War. During his career he worked in a variety of media, including mosaic and fresco. He showed his work at major exhibitions, including the Rome Quadrennial, and won art prizes from major institutions.

wiki/Gino_Severini

Gerardo Dottori, an Italian Futurist

Ciclista

Incendio nella città (City in Flames), 1926

Crocefissione (1928)

Gerardo Dottori (11 November 1884 - 13 June 1977) was an Italian Futurist painter. He signed the Futurist Manifesto of Aeropainting in 1929. He was associated with the city of Perugia most of his life, living in Milan for six months as a student and in Rome from 1926-39.

Dottori's' principal output was the representation of landscapes and visions of Umbria, mostly viewed from a great height. Among the most famous of these is Umbrian Spring and Fire in the City, both from the early 1920s.

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

Italian Futurism: Carlo Carrà

Paesaggio sotto la neve (1910) olio su tela, 

Collezione Marina e Antonio Forchino, Torino

The funeral of the anarchist Galli (1911)

Cavaliere rosso

Manifestazione Interventista (1914)

Western Horseman, 1917

A Pine by the Sea 1921

Autunno al mare (1927)

Carlo Carrà - Foce del Cinquale, 1928

Partita di Calcio (1934)

Carlo Carrà (February 11, 1881 – April 13, 1966) was an Italian painter, a leading figure of the Futurist movement that flourished in Italy during the beginning of the 20th century. In addition to his many paintings, he wrote a number of books concerning art. He taught for many years in the city of Milan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlo_Carr%C3%A0

Italian Futurism: Umberto Boccioni

Landscape, 1908-1909

Riot in the Galleria, 1910

The strengths of a street, 1911

Testa di Bambina, 1911. Oil on canvas.

 Glass and Syphon, 1913

Dynamism of a Soccer Player, 1913

Carica di lancieri, 1915

Mountain Landscape, 1916

Umberto Boccioni (19 October 1882 – 17 August 1916) was an influential Italian painter and sculptor. He helped shape the revolutionary aesthetic of the Futurism movement as one of its principal figures. Despite his short life, his approach to the dynamism of form and the deconstruction of solid mass guided artists long after his death. His works are held by many public art museums, and in 1988 the Museum of Modern Art in New York organized a major retrospective of 100 pieces.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Boccioni

Giacomo Balla, Autosmorfia

Autosmorfia (self-portrait)

Self-Portrait (1902)

Girl running on a balcony (1912), oil on canvas

This particular piece of art is a kinesthetic study of a figure in motion. Mimicking the pointillist technique, Balla has not mixed the non-primary colors, but creates them by painting contrasting dots in close contact to one another. This technique is repeated throughout the picture's surface. The artwork does not have a central point of focus. It appears to be continuing outside the canvas to the spectator’s space, emphasizing the continuous character of the girl’s motion.

Dinamismo di un cane al guinzaglio

(Dynamism of a dog on a leash) (1912)

Here Balla got to grips with the problem of recreating speed and flight by superimposing several images on top of each other. Inevitably, the advances that were made by this short-lived movement were eventually to be overtaken by the art of cinematography.

Speed of a Motorcycle 1913-14

Planet Mercury Passing in Front of the Sun, 1914

Mercurio Sole

Plastic Ensemble (1915)

Autostati d’animo (1920)

Future, 1923

Born in 1871, Giacomo Balla was the senior member of the first wave of Futurist painters and was a teacher (Umberto Boccioni and Gino Severini were pupils). His early, pre-Futurist period was influenced by the pointillism of Georges Seurat. In 1912 he joined the Futurist movement. His painting style underwent a dramatic change about 1909 when he became preoccupied with the pictorial depiction of light, movement and speed. In his work to 1914 he decomposed movement and light but his compositions moved ever closer to total abstraction as, for example, with Perils of War (1915). By 1914 Balla was advocating a Futurist lifestyle - he even named his two daughters Propeller and Light - and his energies expanded to include sculpture and the applied arts, especially costume and theatre design. In the Twenties, during the so-called second wave of Futurism, Balla was still a compelling force within the ranks of the new, young Futurists. Gradually giving more value to geometric forms, his style regularly alternated between abstract machine-like constructions and figurative representations. Giacomo Balla died in 1958.

source: trindera