Author Archives: x.yu7

Umberto Boccioni- The City Rises (1910)

On my visit to the Museum of Modern Art, it was something new and modernize experience. I saw a lot of paintings that are indescribable and world-known. One particular artwork I found that caught my attention was Umberto Boccioni’s painting, “The City Rises” painted in 1910. It was considered as Boccioni’s first major Futurist work. Umberto Boccioni(1882-1916) was an Italian painter and sculptor who was born in Reggio Calabria, Southern Italy and died in Verona. He was an outstanding representative of futurism and considered as the most thoughtful person in the futurist movement. Boccioni was a student in the Barra studio, after accepting the futuristic theory of the futurist poet, Marinetti, and determined visual arts could express the theory. He met Marinetti after the first futuristic declaration in the Figaro newspaper and became a futurist theorist. The main concern that he’s trying to express throughout his artworks is to give life and the feeling of movements to substances.

“The City Rises” is an oil on canvas painting. The foreground in the art is a vast red running horse, which is full of vitality and hooves forward. In front of it, the people fall like paper cards. The background is the emerging industrial construction. According to what Boccioni have created in the painting, the symbolic meaning is one giant horse implies the modern industrial civilization that the futurist is obsessed with in that period of time. It is developing rapidly in an unstoppable state, and the crowd hints at the vitality of labor. Therefore, the painting portrays the construction of a new city, with developments and technology. The picture expresses the futuristic creed of bright, high-purity colors, sparkling light, intense, exaggerated dynamics, and swirling strokes: the worship of speed, movement, power, and industry.

This work also reflects the aesthetic preferences associated with Modernism by Boccioni’s believe in Futurism. The movement of futurism in modernism was all about speed and the advancements that were being made in technology at the time. Therefore, the modernist form of this painting was involved with the depiction of images which look as if they are in motion. In the art, people were struck by the rapid industrial production speed. Some can’t support this powerful rhythm and fall. As an example of futuristic painting, this painting contains some horror to the industrialization of modern society.

The painting was right next to where the Museum had a little board for the author’s name, Umberto Boccioni. It took up about one entire side of the wall. I didn’t realize the figures that the painting used in the first glaze, and then I noticed there is a giant horse in the artwork. People were standing in the middle of the walkway right in front of the painting to appreciate the artwork that Boccioni have done. What drew me to this painting was how people stop there and whispering to each other by just talking about what they thought on the meaning behind this artwork. The painting got me so interested when I didn’t know what it was in the art in the first glaze. I wanted to know the story behind this artwork and get to know the painter.

Questions about the work:

Why did Umberto Boccioni use the figure of a horse in this painting? Why did he believe in Futurism? What comes to his mind when he created this painting?

According to Frank Kafka’s works of the ‘The Metamorphosis’ in 1915, its prudent that isolation and alienation are the major themes as proven by Gregor’s physical transformation into a creature that strips him of his humanity in the eyes of his family, and his inability to communicate further makes him feel greatly isolated, since his family often defines him by his ability to work, something that is now difficult for him to do due to his metamorphosed condition.

Alienation is discrimination due to certain particular aspects which could be outlined as a specific contagious illness, race, poverty, etc. Just like Gregor’s case of isolation and alienation, such occurrences and experiences also happen in real life situations away from the fiction world of imagination such as Frank Kafka’s, of Gregor waking up on a particular day only to find himself transformed into a gigantic insect, ways from his normal being of being a salesman and the sole provider of his family. Isolation also serves to separate individuals who are sick from those who are well, for instance, Gregor’s case.
A real-life situation once experienced is of persons with big working titles, working in substantial productive companies and institutions that are vastly spread both national and international wise, and are the breadwinning parties in their either nuclear or even extended families; providing food, shelter and other essential and luxurious needs but end up being diagnosed with chronic and most feared illnesses such as cancer, HIV/AIDS or even Diabetes.

Narrowing down these illnesses, individuals who have HIV/AIDS are the most likely ones to isolation and alienation from the society by every other individual since the disease is highly infectious and cursed by many most especially in the African nation. Once an individual is diagnosed with the virus, fear develops among people around him or her leading to actions such as being sucked from work, one which most probably was the primary source of income due individuals’ benefit of doubt to such a person that he or she might work inefficiently as a result of the infection.

Once an individual is viewed from such a perspective, discrimination, stigmatization, isolation and alienation follows, rendering that person ‘useless’ and ‘inefficient’ to fulfill a family’s needs, just like Gregor’s father viewed and treated Gregor, the moment he realized he could not work or communicate anymore or even provide for the family since he had turned from being a normal human being to a giant insect.

Hello everyone,

My name is Xiuling Yu. I’m 19 years old and currently a sophomore at Baruch College. I’m majoring in Accounting and haven’t made my decision on what to study for the minor. I was immigrated from China by my parents in 2010 when I was 11 years old. I started my new life in the state of Georgia and stayed there until my sophomore year of high school. I’m currently live in Queens, New York for five years. I have siblings, one sister, and brother and they’re so annoying. I started having part-time jobs in my senior year of high school, and I have enjoyed all my posts so far. I had worked in Target, restaurants as a cashier, bubble tea stores, daycare, and tutoring schools. I like new things by going to different environments and meeting new people to expand my knowledge of thinking about this society. I’m not a very outgoing person, but if you give me some time, I will be very close to you.

I love to travel anywhere that I could go. I don’t like staying home because all I do is sleep, laying down or be on the phone and iPad all day long. So far, I had been to Thailand, Hawaii, Canada, Los Angeles and Puerto Rico. Shortly, I hope I could be living in Los Angeles because I love the city. I love the weather, environment, people, and everything else.

Some of my hobbies include shopping everywhere, sleeping, watching drama shows, texting or talking to friends on the phone (all day long), and lastly is eating, eating, and eating. I love food. I like different cuisines of food, and it could be from many countries. I want to try out new foods with unique tastes. I immensely love ice creams. I need to have ice cream mostly every day, but except for the winter time so I hate winter because it is too cold to eat ice cream.

Furthermore, I’m looking forward to this English 2850 class and ready to learn a lot of new things. I will try my best in this course as I usually do in other English classes because my writing is not as good as it should be. I hope everything goes well throughout this semester.