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International Yearbook of Futurism Studies
International Yearbook
of Futurism Studies

Edited by
Günter Berghaus

Editorial Board
Matteo D’Ambrosio · Marjorie Perloff · Irina Subotić ·
Jorge Schwartz

Contributing Editors
Matteo Fochessati · Rubén Gallo ·
Przemysław Strożek · Pierantonio Zanotti
International Yearbook
of Futurism Studies

Volume 12
2022

Open Issue

Edited by
Günter Berghaus

With the assistance of Mariana Aguirre (†) and


Sze Wah Lee
ISBN 978-3-11-079989-7
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-080092-0
ISSN 2192-0281

A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress.

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek


The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie;
detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de.

© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston


Typesetting: 3w+p GmbH, Rimpar
Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck

www.degruyter.com
Table of Contents

Günter Berghaus
Editorial IX

Section 1: Futurism Studies

Giacomo Coronelli
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 3

Giuseppe Virelli
From Bologna to the World: The International Futurism of Athos
Casarini 51

Thomas Hunkeler
Parisian Rivalries before the War: Futurism and Cubism as Enemy Brothers
(1912 – 1914) 93

Günter Berghaus
Futurism in Occupied Fiume, 1919 – 1920 123

Monica Cioli
Italian Futurism between Fascism, Modernism and Nazi Germany 163

Eugene Ostashevsky
Vasily Kamensky and F. T. Marinetti: Italian Words-in-Freedom and Russian
Typographic Visual Poetry 189

Kasper Pfeifer
The Scream of the Boor: Bruno Jasieński and the Politics of Art in Polish
Futurism 225

Ricardo Vasconcelos
A Rêve onanistique: Futurism and Portuguese National Identity in Raul Leal’s
Correspondence with Filippo Tommaso Marinetti 247
VI Table of Contents

Duarte Drumond Braga


Futurism in Goa: Early Interactions with Marinetti in Portugal’s Colony in
India 279

Cedric Van Dijck


Out of the Archive: Marinetti in Cambridge (1914) 307

Section 2: Obituaries and Anniversaries

Günter Berghaus, Deborah Dorotinsky, Daniella Blejer, Rita Eder, Sandra


Zetina
Mariana Aguirre (1977 – 2022): Obituary 329

Sergey Biryukov, Andrey Rossomakhin


Akademiia Zaumi 339

Irina Subotić
The 100th Anniversary of Zenit (1921 – 2021): Futurism and the Yugoslav
Avant-garde 349

Section 3: Critical Responses to Exhibitions, Conferences and


Publications
Mariateresa Chirico
Cesare Andreoni (1903 – 1961), a Futurist in Milan: A Study Day Promoted by
the Archivio Cesare Andreoni in Milan 361

Giuseppe Virelli
Aroldo Bonzagni and His (almost) Futurist Epoch 367

Ekaterina Lazareva
Italian Futurism in the Gianni Mattioli Collection Presented in Russia
(2021) 375

Juan Agustín Mancebo Roca


Depero New Depero: Rovereto Presents the Artist and His Reception after
1960 385
Table of Contents VII

Luigi Weber
The Futurist Novel before and After the First World War 399

Monica Biasiolo
Paolo Buzzi and the Futurist chiaro di luna 405

Deirdre O’Grady
Gian Pietro Lucini in Context: Futurism and the Pursuit of a New
‘Avant-garde’ 413

Stephen J. Bury
Fortunato Depero’s ‘Bolted Book’ 419

Larissa Maria Müller


Visualizing the Invisible: Photography and Futurist Art 427

Maddalena Carli
The Permanent Revolution of Fascist Art 433

Renée M. Silverman
Space, Geography and Centre-Periphery Relations: New Perspectives on
Ultraism and Estridentism, 1918 – 1927 439

Günter Berghaus
Ilya Zdanevich (Iliazd): Ambassador of Georgian Futurism 445

Section 4: Bibliography

A Bibliography of Publications on Futurism, 2019 – 2022 467

Section 5: Back Matter

List of Illustrations and Provenance Descriptions 495

Notes on Contributors 501

Name Index 509


VIII Table of Contents

Subject Index 541

Geographical Index 571


Günter Berghaus
Editorial

The twelfth volume of the International Yearbook of Futurism Studies follows


close on the heels of the special issue of 2021 on Futurism and the Sacred. Al-
though the latter had been in the making since 2018, it went through an unusu-
ally difficult editorial process, exacerbated by the outbreak of COVID-19. The clo-
sure of many universities and libraries and the death of several esteemed
colleagues imposed severe obstacles upon our work. It was only in the summer
of 2021, when the pandemic temporarily receded and an improved health situa-
tion allowed us to continue with our work, that the volume for 2021 could be
completed. While the last essays for volume 2022 moved into the final editing
stage, we finalized plans for the 2023 volume on Neo-Futurism. Next, we were
thrown back with our planning for the next special issue on the theme of Futur-
ism and Primitivism, due to the tragic death of our co-editor Mariana Aguirre, an
expert on Primitivism, who had begun discussion with potential contributors to
the volume. We are still planning to go ahead with this issue, albeit in different
form and with different emphases.
Section 1 of Yearbook 2022 contains ten essays on Futurist art and literature
in Italy, the USA, France, Russia, Poland, Portugal and its former colony Goa. We
begin with the second part of Giacomo Coronelli’s bibliographical and typo-
graphical investigations into the early Futurist publishing business, The Futurist
Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered. The author pres-
ents many new insights into the ways in which the founder of Futurism em-
ployed different media (manifestos, press releases, newssheets) for his propa-
ganda initiatives. Focussing on the Manifesto of the Futurist Painters, the
Technical Manifesto of Futurist Paintings and the flyer Futurist Venice, the author
shows how our standard interpretation of these texts need to be thoroughly re-
vised due to many variant printings and editions in Italian, French and English
he has discovered. Coronelli’s research into Marinetti’s book publishing activities
brought to light a large number of previously unknown facts. In contrast to many
other avant-garde leaders of the early twentieth century, Marinetti decided to re-
place the medium of the magazine as the dominant medium of communication
with manifesto leaflets, printed in large quantities, in many editions (often con-
taining substantial textual changes) and in various languages. Coronelli’s essay
provides vital information on these imprints that will eventually help us to estab-
lish an accurate timeline of the formation of and changes in the membership of
Marinetti’s group.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110800920-001
X Günter Berghaus

Giuseppe Virelli discusses the complex interdependence of art and politics


in his essay From Bologna to the World: The International Futurism of Athos
Casarini. The artist examined here is little known even amongst experts in Fu-
turism Studies, largely as a consequence of his untimely death during the First
World War. Yet, he played an important rôle in the cultural life of his day, espe-
cially in Emilia-Romagna and the Italian exile community in the United States of
America. He exhibited in several New York galleries and in the famous Armory
Show of 1913, was active in the Union Internationale des Beaux-Arts et Lettres
and was invited to exhibit ten works at the 1914 Salon d’Automne in Paris. Virelli
offers us a substantial monograph, the first in English, on this artist and covers
the full gamut of his career. He shows that Casarini’s initial encounter with the
men who would later become protagonists of the Futurist movement did not
occur in Bologna, but in Milan, between 1908 and 1909, through the painter
Ugo Valeri. Casarini was probably the first Bolognese to convert to Futurism,
but frustrated by the traditionalist local culture, and eager to engage with a
more ‘advanced’ and modern society, he moved to New York in the spring of
1909. Here, he fully converted to Marinetti’s programme and became the first Fu-
turist to live and work in the USA. Virelli thus offers us in this essay both a com-
pressed history of early Futurism in Bologna and a valuable insight into the for-
mation of Futurism in the USA in the 1910s.
Thomas Hunkeler concerns himself with the comparative study of French
and Italian literature and has shown in a number of book publications how var-
ious avant-garde movements cooperated and competed in the international
scene. His essay Parisian Rivalries Before the War: Futurism and Cubism
as Enemy Brothers (1912 – 1914) begins with the exhibition of Futurist painters
at the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery in 1912. It is well known that this landmark event
gave rise, in Paris, to an intense rivalry between various factions in modern art
and literature. Reactions from the establishment were no less critical than those
from certain quarters in the artistic world. Hunkeler introduces us to specific dis-
courses in the French artistic field of the time, which presented Paris as the un-
disputed leader in the global arts and promoted the idea that modern art was
essentially a phenomenon of French origin, notably represented by Cubism. In-
terestingly, Cubism was initially perceived by the French public as being of Ger-
man or at least of foreign origin. It was only in the 1910s that it was progressively
perceived as an authentically French response to an artistic invasion from
abroad. Hunkeler looks at the rôle played in this debate by three key figures
of the Parisian avant-garde: André Salmon, Albert Gleizes and Ricciotto Canudo.
He discusses the nationalist underpinnings of their writings, especially in their
critiques of the Futurists’ proclivity towards scandal, of their pugnacity and
their desire to establish themselves as the leading avant-garde of the time.
Editorial XI

The next two essays examine a broad spectrum of political issues related to
the Futurist movement in Italy. Günter Berghaus investigated twenty-five years
ago the Futurist activities in Fiume (Rijeka) during the city’s occupation by Ga-
briele D’Annunzio’s troops (1919 – 1920) in his book Futurism and Politics (1996),
largely by drawing on documents preserved in Italian archives and librararies.
Since then, he has repeatedly travelled to Croatia to inspect source material in
institutions that only opened up to Western scholars after the fall of the Iron Cur-
tain and the dissolution of the State of Yugoslavia. His essay Futurism in Occu-
pied Fiume, 1919 – 1920 was written to mark the centennial of the annexation of
Fiume to Italy in 1919. But it also incorporates insights gained during the anni-
versary year when, on the one hand, right-wing circles in Italy proclaimed their
revisionist and Irredentist agenda for the former Austrian Littoral, and on the
other hand, Croatian scholars and politicians reminded us of the fact that Rijeka,
the ‘Martyr City’, experienced in 1919 a veritable ‘holocaust’. He experienced first
hand how the impresa dannunziana gave rise to an anniversary that divided the
scholarly community at conferences. He could observe how ideological manipu-
lations of the historical events were spread by the media on both sides of the bor-
der. The essay that results from thirty years of studying the Futurist activities in
Fiume preceding, during and following Gabriele D’Annunzio’s occupation revis-
its established facts and presents new insights. It is well known that the Futurists
were at the forefront of the social and artistic experiments carried out in Fume.
The occupied city seemed to offer a model of how to build a new civilization on
the ruins of the German, Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman empires. The
essay presents the activities of the Fascio futurista fiumanese, outlines the vision-
ary concepts in Futurist manifestos and programmatic statements published in
Fiume and investigates to what degree these ideas could be given concrete real-
ization in festivals, social rituals and libertarian artistic creations. Although Ma-
rinetti only stayed a fortnight in Fiume, he was part of at least two plots to ex-
tend the Impresa to other parts of Italy by means of terrorist attacks, which
are discussed here, also with regard to their later literary metamorphoses in Il
poema di Fiume (c.1930 – 31).
Monica Cioli, an expert on contemporary history and the history of political
thought in Italy and Germany, focusses on Italian Futurism between Fascism,
Modernism and Nazi Germany on the Degenerate Art Exhibition, held in Mu-
nich in 1937, and its implications for Futurism. She discusses some of the Futurist
responses to the Nazi assault on modern art and to the reactionary forces in Fas-
cist Italy that sought to implement measures similar to those adopted in Germa-
ny in the mid-1930s. Cioli examines the cultural politics of the Third Reich as well
as Futurist attitudes towards German anti-Modernism after Hitler’s seizure of
XII Günter Berghaus

power in 1933. Particular attention is given to Futurist responses to Hitler in Il


merlo (Paris) and Artecrazia (Rome).
The international diffusion of Futurism in the Slavic world is the topic of the
next two essays. Eugene Ostashevsky has been engaged in recent years in an
English translation of a masterpiece of Futurist book art, Vasily Kamensky’s
Tango s korovami (Tango with Cows, 1914). He draws on this experience in his
essay Vasily Kamensky and F.T. Marinetti: Italian Words-in-Freedom and
Russian Typographic Visual Poetry and discusses how the avant-garde typog-
raphy of this visual poetry book relates to Marinetti’s call for “a typographic rev-
olution” in the manifesto Distruzione della sintassi – Immaginazione senza fili –
Parole in libertà (Destruction of Syntax – Untrammelled Imagination – Words-in-
Freedom, 1913). Compared with other innovative Futurist books in Russia, Ka-
mensky’s Tango with Cows strikes the reader as rather Italianate and begs the
question as to whether the author was aware of Marinetti’s manifesto and the
first examples of parole in libertà published in late 1913 / early 1914. Ostashevsky
investigates whether Kamensky’s poems can be related to Marinetti’s visit to Rus-
sia, which took place shortly before the publication of Tango with Cows. He also
addresses the question of whether the Russian poet had access to Marinetti’s first
book-length experiment with Words-in-Freedom, Zang Tumb Tuuum: Adrianopoli
ottobre 1912, hot off the press in early 1914.
Kasper Pfeifer is a young scholar currently engaged in writing a book on
Bruno Jasieński, one of the most prominent Polish Futurists, in which he exam-
ines the revolutionary postulates of the author oscillating between the avant-
garde and Socialist Realism. In his essay The Scream of the Boor: Bruno Ja-
sieński and the Politics of Art in Polish Futurism he investigates the Futurist
œuvre of the writer and how he sought to undermine the dominant artistic dis-
courses and hierarchical social structures. After he became one of the founders
of Pod Katarynką, a Futurist group in Krakow active in 1919 – 21, Jasieński adopt-
ed the revolutionary ideas of Russian Futurists and French avant-garde authors.
He questioned the ‘transparency’ of language, arguing that it formed the back-
bone of agency and a cornerstone of class emancipation. Beginning as an enfant
terrible of young Polish literature, Jasieński’s literary output became increasingly
conventional. He distanced himself from the radical demands of his early mani-
festos and wrote poetry characterized by a return to order. Jasieński relinquished
his avant-garde stance and embraced Socialist Realism in an attempt to enable
the lower classes to participate in the creation of a comprehensible and accessi-
ble art. Pfeifer discusses these contradictions in Jasieński’s theory and praxis
and assesses his view that only a successful ‘futurization’ of a community of
equals could lead to a rebirth of Polish society.
Editorial XIII

Ricardo Vasconcelos reported in the last Yearbook on new research unter-


taken in Portugal on the life and œuvre of Santa Rita Pintor. In this volume he
returns to another leading Portuguese Futurist in A “Rêve onanistique”: Futur-
ism and Portuguese National Identity in Raul Leal’s Correspondence with
F.T. Marinetti. He contextualizes central aspects of Raul Leal’s intellectual life
and analyses his contributions to the journals Orpheu (1915) and Portugal futur-
ista (1917). During the 1920s, Leal scandalized Portugal with a variety of pam-
phlets, most significantly his defence of homosexuality in Sodoma divinisada
(Sodom Deified, 1923). Now a relatively obscure figure in Portuguese Modernism
and Futurism Studies, Leal had at the time the reputation of being one of the
most irreverent figures in Portuguese literature. Vasconcelos’ discovery of a
cache of letters which Leal exchanged with Marinetti and several books he dedi-
cated to him demonstrates that we need to revisit the rôle of this writer in the
dialogue between Portuguese culture and International Futurism. The example
of Raul Leal shows that Futurism inspired the most heterodox responses, capable
of engaging with questions of national identity, religion and sexual freedom.
Duarte Nuno Drumond Braga’s main field of research is Lusophone litera-
ture in Portugal’s former colonies Brazil, Goa and Macau. His essay Futurism in
Goa: Early Interactions with Marinetti in Portugal’s Indian Colony offers an
important critique of the persistent Eurocentrism in the academic discipline of
Modernism Studies, which rarely considers how the European avant-gardes im-
pacted on the artistic creativity in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Goa is a terri-
tory located on the Western coast of India and was a Portuguese colony from
1510 to 1961. During the early twentieth-century, a group of Goan poets created
an innovative literature that offers pertinent material for a reconsideration of
current canons in Modernism and Avant-garde Studies. Marinetti’s late-Symbol-
ist and early Futurist publications were discussed in Goan magazines, especially
by Paulino Dias and Nascimento Mendonça, who are the focus of Braga’s essay.
In 1913, Dias launched the Revista da Índia and cultivated Portuguese as well as
Hindu literary traditions within a Europeanized milieu. The magazine’s founding
manifesto, authored by Dias and translated here for the first time into English,
and Mendonças’ reviews of Futurist publications emerged before the eruption
of Portuguese Modernism in 1915 and the rise of Modernism in India. It therefore
overturns established chronologies which always assume that the colonies
adopted innovative currents much later than the (Western) motherlands. Futur-
ism’s contribution to the culture of the Portuguese colony in India is still a large-
ly unexplored topic. Interestingly, Dias vernacularized Italian Futurism and com-
bined it with a complex recovery of Hindu culture. He gathered and combined
opposing aesthetics, such as tradition and innovation, preservation and destruc-
tion, nationalism and internationalism. His unusual mixture of European avant-
XIV Günter Berghaus

garde aesthetics and Vedic imagery gave rise to a hybrid heritage within a Euro-
Asian modernity.
Cedric Van Dijck offers in his essay Out of the Archive: Marinetti in Cam-
bridge (1914) a useful complement to Coronelli’s discussion of Marinetti’s prop-
aganda campaign in the English-speaking world by means of the broadsheet Fu-
turist Venice (July 1910), his Lecture to the English at the Lyceum Club in London
(13 December 1910) and the leaflet Manifesto of the Futurist Painters (probably
printed in August 1911). Much has been written on the Futurist activities in Lon-
don at the time of their Exhibition of Works by the Italian Futurist Painters there
(Sackville Gallery, March 1912) and the repercussions of Marinetti’s performances
at the Doré Galleries on 28 April and 13 June 1914. But even standard works fail to
mention that the Futurist leader also visited the University of Cambridge, no
doubt prompted by his concerted efforts to garnish the support and sympathies
of students, who in various countries proved to be the most enthusiastic support-
ers of the Futurist aesthetic and political progamme. On 3 June 1914, Marinett de-
livered a lecture on Futurism and recited, amongst other items, from his recent
manifesto Vital English Art and passages from his book Zang tumb tuuum. He
was then given an opportunity to promote his ideas in The Cambridge Magazine
(which printed Vital English Art on 13 June 1914), Mandragora (which printed ex-
cerpts from Zang tumb tuuum in May 1914). In the appendix, Van Dijck reprints
seven rare documents, including reports on Marinetti’s lecture and the animated
responses he received from the students.
In Section 2: Obituaries and anniversaries we have to report, as men-
tioned above, the sad fact that one of the most dependable members of our ed-
itorial team, Mariana Aguirre, died on 14 January 2022. Mariana had served as an
editorial assistant on the International Yearbook of Futurism Studies since 2013.
Over the years, she became a trusted collaborator, co-editing volumes and
each year taking on responsibility for essays that needed special attention
from a linguistic viewpoint. Since 2021, she had been active in the process of
co-editing a special issue of the Yearbook on the theme of Futurism and Primitiv-
ism. Mariana’s scholarly achievements and activities in the Mexican art scene are
remembered in an obituary written jointly by four of her colleagues from Mexico
and myself.
In the International Yearbook of Futurism Studies 5 (2015) we published a
portrayal of the International Academy of Zaum, founded in the Russian city
of Tambov in 1990. This loose network of poets and scholars promotes research
into avant-garde art in the widest sense of the word and gives encouragement to
anyone who considers the transrational poetry of Russian Futurism to be a
source of inspiration for producing innovative sound and visual poetry all
over the world. I asked its founder, Sergey Biryukov, to give us a personal ac-
Editorial XV

count of the growth and proliferation of this institution. His reminiscences are
complemented here by a brief homage written by Andrei Rossomakhin, editor-
in-chief of the Avant-Garde series published by the European University in
Saint Petersburg. This publishing venture has provided a platform for many
members of the Academy of Zaum, both as authors and members of the editorial
board, to promote the ethos and the achievements of a new generation of ‘beyon-
sense’ poets.
Irina Subotić, well known to readers of our yearbook from her insightful
essay on the similarities and differences between Futurism and Zenitism in the
first volume of our periodical in 2011, has been a major coordinator of events
in the centenary year of Zenit, a magazine published from 1921 to 1926 in Zagreb
and Belgrade. Created by Ljubomir Micić, it became the most influential period-
ical for the avant-garde in the Balkans. It promoted various artistic tendencies,
ranging from Expressionism and Dadaism to Futurism, Surrealism and Construc-
tivism. Zenitism was close to the second generation of Italian Futurists and their
ideas of dynamism, technological progress, machine art, typographic innovation
and primitivism. Both movements pursued a fervent crusade against a decadent,
conservative and moribund ‘old Europe’. Irina Subotić reports on a number of
events, conferences, exhibitions and publications that reflect our current knowl-
edge of the Zenitist movement, the magazine itself and its editor. The anniversary
demonstrated that the young generation in Serbia and Croatia can still find in-
spiration from the multifaceted activities organized or coordinated by the maga-
zine’s collaborators in the 1920s. As an extension of the Zenit jubilee, the city of
Novi Sad, upon becoming European Capital of Culture for 2022, presented on 13
January 2022 Zeniteum :: 2022, an open air show devised by the Slovenian artist
Dragan Živadinov. It took inspiration from a scenic architecture developed by
Micić and Jo Klek in 1924. We asked Dragan Živadinov and his partner Dunja Zu-
pančić to send us an artist’s statement, which we have attached to the report.
Section 3: Critical responses to exhibitions, conferences and publica-
tions is longer than usual, as it accommodates reports and reviews that were
originally considered for Yearbooks 2021 and 2023, but reached us either too
late or – rather unusually – before the agreed deadline. Mariateresa Chirico
gives us an account of the study day “Cesare Andreoni (1903 – 1961), a Futurist
in Milan” that was promoted by the Archivio Cesare Andreoni and held at the
headquarters of AitArt, the Italian Association of Artists’ Archives, on 28 Septem-
ber 2021. Giuseppe Virelli reviews an exhibition that provided a rare chance to
see a representative cross-selection of works by one of the founding members
of the first Futurist group in Milan, Aroldo Bonzagni. He discusses the painter’s
artistic choices that brought him into conflict with Boccioni and ponders the
question of why Bonzagni decided to withdraw from the movement of which
XVI Günter Berghaus

he had been such an active supporter. Ekaterina Lazareva offers a critical view
on the first international showing of the Mattioli Collection for nearly fifty
years. It took place in 2021– 22 in Saint Petersburg and Moscow, where Italian Fu-
turist paintings are rarely on display.
One of the most important Futurist museums and archives is the Museo
d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto (MART). Its origins are in-
timately connected to Fortunato Depero, in particular the Galleria-Museo Depero
conceived by the artist himself between 1956 and 1959. Over the years, MART has
organized an extensive exhibition programme dedicated to the artist from Rover-
eto. In 2021– 22, the museum and the City of Rovereto celebrated the artist, his
rôle within the city and the province of Trento, and his reception amongst the
younger generation of Italian artists. Of the nine exhibitons altogether, Juan
Agustín Mancebo Roca has chosen two for a comprehensive assessments: Depero
New Depero, with an emphasis on the artist’s influence on artists, designers and
creators of audio-visual artworks, and Depero e la sua casa d’arte, focussed on
Depero’s decorative art workshop (1919 – 1942).
A number of important new books on Futurist art and literature appeared in
the past years, and eight of them were chosen for review here. Luigi Weber dis-
cusses Barbara Meazzi’s survey of Futurist novels in “Il fantasma del romanzo”:
Le futurisme italien et l’écriture romanesque (1909 – 1920). Monica Biasiolo re-
views Elena Rampazzo’s Futurista al chiaro di luna: La poesia di Paolo Buzzi
fra tradizione e avanguardia, a study of the poetry of one of Futurism’s most im-
portant poets and close collaborator of F.T. Marinetti. Also Isabella Pugliese’s
Poeta e ribelle: Gian Pietro Lucini teorico e critico della letteratura, reviewed
here by Deirdre O’Grady, is rooted in a dottorato di ricerca and provides many
new insights into the initial Futurist circle and one of its key members, who
was the first to clash with Marinetti and to declare the need to “go beyond” Fu-
turism. Another re-worked dissertation issued for the general public is discussed
by Stephen J. Bury, a great expert on Futurist artists’ books: Gianluca Camillini’s
Fortunato Depero and Depero futurista 1913 – 1927. This study offers a comprehen-
sive examination of the so-called ‘Bolted Book’ (libro imbullonato) with regard to
the design methodologies adopted by Depero, his interest in the field of adver-
tising, the book’s formal features and its political context.
David Mather in Futurist Conditions: Imagining Time in Italian Futurism ana-
lyses how photography triggered some radical changes in the visual imagery of
Futurism, particularly in the works of Anton-Giulio Bragaglia, Giacomo Balla and
Umberto Boccioni. Larissa Müller discusses Mather’s broadly based historical,
synchronic and comparatist approach to a complex and multidimensional as-
pect of Futurism’s artistic practice. Maddalena Carli assesses how Lucia Piccioni,
in her book on Art et fascisme: Peindre l’italianité (1922 – 1943), interprets the
Editorial XVII

manner in which Futurism vied with Novecento, Stracittà and Strapaese for the
status of an ‘official’ State art in Fascist Italy. Although Futurism runs like a fil
rouge throughout this study, special attention is given to aeropainting and the
exaltation of the so-called aerovita, which promoted aviation as a political, mili-
tary and spiritual symbol of Fascist Italy, thus serving as a ideological buttress to
Fascism’s militarist endeavours in the 1930s.
Claudio Palomares-Salas has brought together years of research into ultraí-
smo and estridentismo in his new book, The Spatiality of the Hispanic Avant-
garde. It is given a critical reading by Renée M. Silverman, herself an expert in
this field, who finds that the two avant-garde movements from Spain and Mexico
explored in the 1910s and 1920s the interrelationship between space, social and
political life on the one hand, and cultural production on the other, in a manner
that bore close resemblance to the Futurist movements’ aesthetics and artistic
practices.
Ilya Zdanevich (pseud. Iliazd) acted as a kind of ‘ambassador of Georgian
Futurism’ when he left his native country and settled in Paris, unlike his brother
Kyrill, who continued to promote Futurism in the Caucasus. Johanna Drucker,
who is a leading scholar of avant-garde book design and experimental typogra-
phy, has previously published on Iliazd’s artist books and had already in 1994
announced a volume on Ilia Zdanevich and the Modern Art of the Book. This
has now seen the light of day in a thoroughly revised edition entitled A Meta-Bi-
ography of a Modernist. Unfortunately, it does not offer a biography of this impor-
tant Futurist. Given the fact that this book is likely to establish itself as a ‘stan-
dard’ work in the field, I considered it opportune to write an extended critique of
the author’s insufficient consultation of the extensive research conducted in Rus-
sia and Georgia and the limited archival foundation of her study.
Finally, our Bibliographic Section: Publications on Futurism, this time
covering the years 2019 – 2022, provides information on 30 exhibition catalogues,
1 special periodical issue, 4 edited volume of conference proceedings, 11 collec-
tive volumes, 44 monographic studies, 44 editions and 3 volumes that turn Fu-
turism into fiction. These 139 book publications are supplemented by 2 sound
and film recordings and show that Futurism Studies continues to be fertile
field of inquiry in many academic quarters around the world.
Section 1: Futurism Studies
Giacomo Coronelli
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910:
Dates and Editions Reconsidered
Abstract: This essay is the second part of my research devoted to Futurist man-
ifestos from 1909 to 1911 and deals with the publishing history of the manifesto
leaflets issued by Marinetti from February to the summer of 1910, when the
founder of Futurism employed this print medium for the first time for a large-
scale propaganda initiative. It discusses the first edition of the Manifesto of
the Futurist Painters, the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Paintings and Futurist
Venice, and investigates their variant printings and editions in Italian, French
and English. My investigations extend to Marinetti’s parallel publishing activites
and have brought to light a number of previously unknown facts which help to
establish a more accurate timeline of the developments in early Futurism. In the
conclusion, this essay addresses the concept of manifesto leaflets as a new
means of communication, which gradually replaced the medium of the magazine
and allowed Marinetti to introduce new ways of managing Futurist propaganda
and the membership of the Futurist group.

Keywords: Manifestos as a literary genre; manifestos as a print medium; Futurist


leaflets and press releases; Marinetti as publisher; Futurist group membership;
Poesia: Rassegna internazionale; Il futurismo: Supplemento alla rassegna interna-
zionale “Poesia”; Futurism in France; Futurism in England; Futurism in the USA

Introduction
The 2020 edition of the International Yearbook of Futurism Studies published a
first part of my research concerning the publishing history of the first Futurist
manifestos, i. e. the series of leaflets released under the aegis of “The Editorial
Office of Poesia” and printed by Poligrafia Italiana, Marinetti’s customary print
shop in Milan, in the very early days of Futurism, from February 1909 until
the end of 1911.¹ In many respects – not least bibliographically – this was a dis-
tinct phase of Futurism, quite different from the one that came immediately after-
wards. Four events coincided at the end of 1911 and “inaugurated a new chapter

 Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909.”

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110800920-002
4 Giacomo Coronelli

in the history of Futurism.”² In his book Le Futurisme, Marinetti presented the


“Direction of the Futurist Movement” as a new organizational chart of his
group.³ On 28 September 1911, the Italo-Turkish War caused Marinetti to write
the belligerent leaflet Per la guerra, sola igiene del mondo (For the War, Sole
Cleanser of the World). Among the other things, it announced the suspension
of all Futurist activities “owing to the poet Marinetti’s absence in the theater
of war.”⁴ This leaflet was the first to be issued under the new brand name “Di-
rection of the Futurist Movement”, based in Milan, at Corso Venezia 61, where
Marinetti had just moved from Via Senato 2. Last, but not least, in December
1911, Poligrafia Italiana ceased its activity as a typesetting and printing office.
Establishing a reliable history of the early editions of Futurist manifestos is
not only of paramount importance for our understanding of the genesis and tex-
tual variants of each manifesto, but also for comprehending the history of the
early years of Italian Futurism. Futurist manifestos were published, first and
foremost, as leaflets. Marinetti established this practice when he was still con-
templating a revival of his monthly magazine Poesia: Rassagna internazionale
(halted in its fifth year with issue 7– 9, dated August–October, but actually re-
leased in December 1909⁵). As an alternative, he considered the launch of a
new weekly periodical entitled Il futurismo, which I shall address at the end of
the present essay. From the spring of 1913 onwards, under the new “Direction
of the Futurist Movement”, Marinetti initiated a reprint of the first manifestos,
originally issued from 1909 to 1911. At the end of 1913, he also issued the first
Italian collection of Futurist manifestos in book form, I manifesti del futurismo
italiano (The Manifestos of Italian Futurism), released in Florence under the La-
cerba imprint, dated 1914. The anthology and the new edition offered opportuni-
ties to make a number of changes and revisions in the texts and paratexts. All
modern scholarly anthologies, beginning with Luciano De Maria’s authoritative
edition of Marinetti’s theoretical writings (Teoria e invenzione futurista, 1968),
rely for the most part on the Lacerba anthology and are, in the light of recent
research,⁶ outdated with regard to the editorial history of each text. However,

 Versari: “The Letterhead”, p. 100. Versari’s essay is the main reference for the following infor-
mations.
 The book was published by his Parisian friend Eduard Sansot in the summer of 1911, but cir-
culated and was reviewed only in the autumn of the year. See Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifes-
tos of 1909”, p. 22, note 57.
 Marinetti: Critical Writings, p. 74.
 See Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, p. 27.
 Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano; Coronelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifesti
futuristi”; D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 5

as my investigations demonstrate, the bibliographical, philological and textual


history of Futurist manifestos is sometimes even more complicated than suggest-
ed in recent studies.
In this new chapter of my research, I focus on the manifestos issued in the
early half of 1910. The publishing history of manifestos released in the second
part of the year and in 1911 will form the topic of a third part, to be published
in Yearbook 2024.

Marinetti’s unusual book-release strategy


Towards the end of 1909, the Parisian publisher Edward Sansot was preparing to
send Mafarka le futuriste: Roman africain (Mafarka the Futurist: An African
Novel) to the printer. It had been announced as “sous presse” in the last issue
of Poesia, released in December 1909,⁷ together with three other works: Enquête
internationale sur le vers libre et Manifeste du Futurisme par F. T. Marinetti (Inter-
national Inquiry on Free Verse and Manifesto of Futurism by F.T. Marinetti), Fu-
turisti e passatisti (Futurist and Passéist) and Aldo Palazzeschi’s Sole mio (My
Sun).⁸ The Enquête internationale had actually been printed months before
this annoucement, around February 1909, by the same printer and on the
same paper stock as Enrico Cavacchioli’s Le ranocchie turchine (The Turquoise
Frogs), and bearing the same introductory piece (the Foundation and Manifesto
of Futurism) and the same publisher advertisements on the last pages.⁹
Marinetti originally conceived Enquête internationale as a propaganda tool
for the Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism in France, just as Le ranocchie
turchine was intended to do in his home country. But soon after, when this

 Poesia 5:7– 9 (August–October 1909), p. 27.


 The Enquête internationale documented answers to an inquiry launched four years earlier, in
Poesia 1:9 (October 1905), and then published in instalments in subsequent issues of the journal.
See Salaris: Marinetti editore, pp. 70 – 75. Sole mio later became L’incendiario (The Arsonist), the
first volume to go under the aegis of the Edizioni futuriste di “Poesia”, printed and released to-
wards the middle of March 1910, as is evident from a review in La tavola rotonda of 27 March
1910. See D’Ambrosio: Nuove verità crudeli, pp. 134– 135, note 38. Futuristi e passatisti would
have been a monumental collection of press releases and replies to the Manifesto of Futurism,
to be published also in French in two separate volumes, Les Remparts du passé and La Victoire
du futurisme. Neither of them was ever printed. See Salaris: Marinetti editore, pp. 83 – 84, and
Berghaus: “Zenitism and Futurism: International Networks in the Historical Avant-Garde”,
pp. 228 – 229, with a reproduction of both advertisements.
 See Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, p. 16.
6 Giacomo Coronelli

book had already been printed,¹⁰ he managed to obtain three columns for his
manifesto on the first page of the prestigious Le Figaro. ¹¹ This unexpected
chance to hog the Parisian limelight must have prompted Marinetti to halt the
public release of the French book and to wait for a fresh occasion to make
use of it for the purpose of spreading the Futurist message in France. Marinetti’s
concern as a publisher, so it seems, was to stagger the release of every printed
matter related to his movement in a manner that would guarantee a steady
flow of publicity to keep attention on Futurism alive.
Documents show that a suitable occasion for the release of the Enquête in-
ternationale came only a year later, even after the publication of Palazzeschi’s
L’incendiario (The Arsonist), i. e. the book announced in Poesia 5:7– 9 as Sole
mio. In fact, in May 1909, Marinetti had his drama Poupées électriques (Electric
Dolls) published by Sansot, again with the Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism
as the opening chapter. Whereas Poesia 5:3 – 6, out in July 1909, announced Le
ranocchie turchine as already published, Enquête internationale was still said
to be “forthcoming.”¹² The same happened in Poesia 5:7– 9, out in December
1909, as well as in a little known ephemeral publication, Il futurismo: Supple-
mento alla rassegna internazionale “Poesia” (anno quinto), out in February
1910.¹³ There is no evidence that the Enquête was actually in circulation before
April 1910, when it was first mentioned in the French press.¹⁴
Also the release of Gian Pietro Lucini’s poetry collection Revolverate (Revolv-
er Shots), dated 1909, was delayed. The book is listed amongst the published
works in the last issue of Poesia, together with Buzzi’s Aeroplani: Canti alati
(Aeroplanes: Winged Songs). But wheras Aeroplani was reviewed in the Italian
press already in mid-October 1909,¹⁵ there was still no mention of Revolverate

 The Florence Central Library received the mandatory copy of Enquête internationale sur le
vers libre in time for the April issue of Bollettino delle pubblicazioni italiane ricevute per diritto
di stampa: 1909 (no. 100, p. 63, item no. 1783).
 See Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, pp. 16 – 20.
 Poesia 5:3 – 6 (April-July 1909), front inner sleeve.
 It was issued to publicize the second Futurist serata at the Teatro Lirico in Milan (15 February
1910). See Salaris: Riviste futuriste, pp. 300 – 305. I shall address this publication more thorough-
ly in the conclusive chapter of the present essay.
 See Le Journal, 1 April 1910, p. 5 col. 6; L’Occident 101, April 1910, p. [138]; Revue germanique
6:3, May–June 1910, p. 370. Interestingly, the bibliographic handbook of French literature edited
by Gustave Lanson has two entries for the Enquête internationale sur le vers libre: one dated
“1910”, the other “1909.” See Lanson: Manuel bibliographique de la littérature française moderne,
p. 1294, no. 18719 and p. 1525, no. 23115.
 The earliest review of Aeroplani that I was able to find was in L’ora 10:288 (16 – 17 October
1909). See De Marco: “L’ora” di Palermo, p. 32.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 7

by late-January 1910.¹⁶ It is worth delving a bit deeper into the publishing history
of Lucini’s book, as it seems typical of the problems we are facing when trying to
date Futurist imprints and the vagaries of membership in the early Futurist
group.
The complicated relationship between Lucini and his publisher is one of the
most fascinating in the early history of Futurism.¹⁷ Immediately after the first
launch of the Manifesto of Futurism in early February 1909, Lucini – who was in-
serted by default in the earliest list of “talents already gathered around the blaz-
ing ensign of Futurism”¹⁸ – unexpectedly declared his firm opposition to
Marinetti’s new literary school. Revolverate should have opened with a preface
by the author, entitled Diffida contro certo “Futurismo” (Be Wary of a Certain
Kind of “Futurism”), a sharply worded attack on Marinetti’s concept of Futurism.
Marinetti complained to the poet that the text was disrespectful to Futurism as a
whole and to him as its leader in particular.¹⁹ Eventually, he himself wrote a Fu-
turist preface in place of the one composed by Lucini.²⁰
After this short-lived discord, there followed a long truce between the two
men, motivated no doubt by both of them gaining kudos from one another: Lu-
cini, who conditionally agreed to be re-admitted in the Futurist group, had an
influential and generous publisher, and Marinetti an important flagship and
an invaluable contact to the youngest generation of poets, who regarded Lucini
as their master. In view of the sequence of these events, it is not surprising that
Lucini’s name, which opened the list of Futurists members in a press release in
early February 1909, was absent in September 1909 from the very same list in the
Second Proclamation, later issued under the better-known title Uccidiamo il

 In a letter sent in late January or early February 1910, as it makes reference to the impending
Futurist serata at the Teatro Lirico in Milan (15 February), Marinetti explained: “Carissimo Luci-
ni, non stupirti del fatto che non vi sono ancora articoli sulle Revolverate, poiché l’invio comple-
to venne fatto soltanto otto giorni fa.” Salaris: Futurismo postale, p. 355.
 In Italian language, there is a wealth of studies on Lucini, many of them of high-quality, for
example De Maria: “Lucini e il futurismo”; Longatti: “Il primo sodalizio Marinetti-Lucini”, and
the introductions to Lucini: Libri e cose scritte, Lucini: Revolverate e Nuove revolverate and Lu-
cini: Marinetti futurismo futuristi. For a recent assessment of this issue in the English language,
see Deirdre O’Grady′s review in this volume of the Yearbook: “Gian Pietro Lucini in Context: Fu-
turism and the Pursuit of a New ‘Avant-garde’.”
 Il futurismo, undated flyer released around 4 February 1909, reproduced in Coronelli: “The
Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, p. 13, fig. 2 and reprinted on pp. 32– 34.
 See Marinetti quoted in Lucini: Revolverate e Nuove revolverate, p. 362: “Ma, senza rancore, ti
prego […] di scrivere […] una prefazione, anche ferocemente contraria al Manifesto, ma debita-
mente rispettosa.”
 Salaris: Futurismo postale, p. 354, publishes a previously unknown letter by Marinetti to Lu-
cini, in which it is clear that adopting the editor’s preface was a shared decision.
8 Giacomo Coronelli

chiaro di luna (Let’s Kill off the Moonlight, 1911). However, he was eventually re-
instated in December 1909 amongst the Futurist brethren addressed in the pref-
ace of Mafarka le futuriste (see Appendix 1).
The recent Handbook of International Futurism summarizes the state of to-
day’s knowledge about the first edition of the original French version of Marinet-
ti’s renowned first novel: “In the critical literature, Mafarka is variously dated
1909 or 1910. The first edition says ‘1909’ on the title page, but ‘1910’ on the
cover. It appears that the book was printed in December 1909, but issued in Jan-
uary 1910.”²¹ In the contemporary French press, however, there is absolutely no
trace of the book until July 1910.²² Barbara Meazzi’s research in the Marinetti Pa-
pers held at the Getty Research Institute helps to clarify the stages of the publish-
ing process.²³ According to documents in Los Angeles, the manuscript was con-
signed to publisher on 1 October 1909, the preface around mid-November,²⁴ and
the bill for publishing the work (2,600 francs for two thousand copies) was set
up on 31 December 1909. Therefore, the announcement in the December 1909
issue of Poesia that Mafarka le futuriste was “in print” was almost certainly cor-
rect. However, contrary to what one would expect, the book was not released the
following January. In the letters sent by Sansot to Marinetti at the end of 1909,
the publisher appears very concerned about the novel’s controversial contents
and fearful that it might be prosecuted. A bill issued by Sansot on 1 April
1910, charging 375 francs for further corrections made to the novel, suggests
that the book was still waiting to be released in the spring of 1910.

 Somigli: “Italy”, p. 581, note 2. See also Meazzi: “Il fantasma del romanzo”, p. 31; Cammarota:
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti: Bibliografia, p. 52, no. 23; Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes,
pp. 149 – 150.
 See Novelli: “Contributo a una bibliografia della fortuna del futurismo in Francia (1909 –
1920)”, p. 224, nos. 73 (Mercure de France 1 July 1910), 74 (Propos 15 July 1910), 75 (Nouvelles
de la République des Lettres, July 1910). To which at least the following should be added: Jean
Clary’s short notice in Pan 3:6 (June–July 1910), p. 407 and Pierre Vanneur’s mention in Le Pen-
seur 10:6 (June 1910), p. 239. Apollinaire received his presentation copy after the summer holi-
days, as he wrote in a postcard to Marinetti on 24 August 1910, first published by Bohn: “Une
lettre à Marinetti” (Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University, New Haven, CT,
GEN MSS 130, Box 7, Folder 97, accessible online at https://brbl-dl.library.yale.edu/vufind/Re
cord/3438141).
 See Meazzi: “Il fantasma del romanzo”, pp. 31– 32.
 The poet’s list in the address to “My Brother Futurists!” that opens the Preface is clearly de-
rived from the shape of the group at the end of 1909, while in Mafarka’s Italian translation, re-
leased only a few months later, in March 1910, this list has almost doubled. See Appendix 1.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 9

It appears that this delay opened up an opportunity, in April 1910, for pub-
lishing the Enquête internationale sur le vers libre. ²⁵ Almost contemporarily, the
Italian translation Mafarka il futurista appeared in the Edizioni futuriste di “Poe-
sia”. The fact that it was immediately seized by the police shows that Sansot’s
fears were indeed justified. The confiscation was mentioned by the Roman news-
paper La ragione on 4 April 1910.²⁶ It is astonishing, though, that a Futurist press
release concerning the seizure of Mafarka il futurista stated that the book was
“already published in Paris in its French version”,²⁷ even though Mafarka le fu-
turiste was still being proofread and would not be released until July. To shed
more light on these strange inconsistencies, we need to probe the complex chro-
nology of events and developments in the first half of 1910, a period packed with
activities, manifestos and other printed matter. This may finally help us to estab-
lish a reliable timeline of the developments in the early history of the Futurist
group.

The first edition of the Manifesto dei pittori


futuristi and its variant reprint
In the first instalment of this essay I argued that the first leaflet featuring the full
text of the Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism was not conceived and printed
in 1909, as is widely assumed, but only in 1910, in order to prepapre the public
for a series of serate that dominated Futurist activity in the first half of that
year.²⁸ The first two serate had as staple ingredients the recitation of the founda-
tion manifesto, of Futurist poems and of bellicose Irredentist proclamations.²⁹
The third serata, held in Turin on 8 March 1910, presented the newly-born
group of Futurist painters and their Manifesto dei pittori futuristi (Manifesto of

 Indeed, the list of Marinetti’s published works on p. 2 of Mafarka le futuriste features the En-
quête internationale sur le vers libre et Manifeste du Futurisme par F. T. Marinetti with a reported
print run of 8,000 copies.
 The article by G.P. Lucini about the requisition (“Il sequestro di ‘Mafarka’”) appeared well in
advance of the other press responses, all dating to early May. See C. Riva: “Toghe talari? Il se-
questro di ‘Mafarka il futurista’ di F.T. Marinetti.” La giovane Italia 35 (15 May 1910): 25 – 26.
D’Ambrosio: Nuove verità crudeli, pp. 280 – 282 for La tavola rotonda nos. 1 and 8, May 1910.
 Mafarka il futurista sequestrato, undated flyer. See Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes,
pp. 193 – 195; Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 14 no. 8.1 (facsimile).
 Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, p. 23 fig. 4 and pp. 27– 29.
 Trieste, Politeama Rossetti, 12 January 1910, and Milan, Teatro Lirico, 15 February. These two
serate have been described and analysed in Berghaus: Italian Futurism Theatre, pp. 86 – 97.
10 Giacomo Coronelli

the Futurist Painters). Even though the details of Marinetti’s meeting with the
five artists who signed the manifesto are still rather muddled,³⁰ the documents
suggest that the launch of the painters’ first manifesto must have been decided
on soon after the Milanese serata of 15 February 1910. There is no trace of the
painters in the Futurist propaganda publicizing the event, nor in its press re-
views. However, two weeks later, around 3 March, the manifesto was already dis-
tributed to the press.³¹
The editio princeps of the Manifesto dei pittori futuristi was a four-page, fold-
ed and unpaginated leaflet measuring 290 x 230 millimetres, very similar to the
almost contemporary leaflet of the Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism. Unlike
this, however, the title “Manifesto dei pittori futuristi” is lowercase, in smaller
print, the words all packed into the same line (see Fig. 1a). The manifesto carries
the signatures of Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carrà, Luigi Russolo, Romolo Romani
and Aroldo Bonzagni, and went under the aegis of “Redazione di Poesia | Via
Senato, 2 – Milano”, with no date given.³² The date “11 February 1910” was
only added later, in the reprint, and is patently fictitious because, as I wrote
above, there was not the faintest trace of a group of Futurist painters, nor of
any manifesto they had in mind, before the Milanese serata of 15 February.
The major changes in the composition of the Futurist painters’ quintet just
after its foundation – and consenquently in the painter’s manifestos – are
well known in their general outline.³³ Romolo Romani and Arolodo Bonzagni,
one after the other, left the group between March and May 1910, to be replaced,
respectively, by Gino Severini and Giacomo Balla. Consequently, Marinetti or-
dered a reprint of the Manifesto dei pittori futuristi with the names of the signa-
tories revised (see Fig. 1b).³⁴ He used the same plates as in the first printing, ex-

 Luciano De Maria’s note in Marinetti: Teoria e invenzione futurista, p. LXXXVII summarizes


the debate, which unfortunately has not made significant progress since 1968. See also Berg-
haus: Italian Futurism Theatre, pp. 54– 55, note 25.
 The “modesto soffietto” (modest press release), i. e. the Manifesto of the Futurist Painters leaf-
let, is referred to in the Milanese newspaper Il tempo of 3 March 1910. See Sassoli de’ Bianchi
Strozzi: “Margherita Sarfatti, Novecento and Futurism”, p. 38, note 6.
 See D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 55 no. 1910/32 (reproduced as facsimile); Tonini:
I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 13 no. 4.1; Coronelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifes-
ti futuristi 1909 – 1910”, pp. 69 – 70 no. 1.
 The major changes that can be found in the reprint of Manifesto dei pittori futuristi were al-
ready detailed in 1985 in Salaris: Storia del futurismo, p. 38. See also the humorous account in
Echaurren: Futurcollezionismo, pp. 9 – 11.
 Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, pp. 12– 13 no. 4.2 (reproduced as facsimile). Coro-
nelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifesti futuristi 1909 – 1910”, p. 70 no. 2. D’Ambrosio:
Manifesti programmatici, p. 56 no. 1910/33, unknowingly reproduces the leaflet of the second ed-
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 11

Fig. 1a. Manifesto dei pittori futuristi. Redazione di “Poesia”. Via Senato, 2 – Milano. Poli-
grafia Italiana–Milano. Issued between 16 February and 2 March 1910. 290 x 230 mm, bifo-
lium. First edition, first printing. Top of the first and bottom of the last page. Fig. 1b. Mani-
festo dei pittori futuristi. Milano, 11 febbraio 1910. Uffici di “Poesia”, Via Senato 2. Poligrafia
Italiana–Milano. Issued between September 1910 and 1911. 290 x 230 mm, bifolium. First
edition, second and last printing. Top of the first and bottom of the third page.

cept for a major interpolation at the beginning of the text, a few other minor
changes here and there, and the bottom lines of the last page with the new
names in the – now definitive – quintet of the Futurist Painters (see Appendix
2). Furthermore, the “Redazione di Poesia” became “Uffici di Poesia”, and the
date “11 February 1910” was added at the foot of the last page (see Appendix
2, section 1.2.6).
Contrary to what is asserted in all the studies on the subject,³⁵ this updated
reprint of the manifesto leaflet did not coincide with the actual changes in the

ition, issued from Spring 1913 onwards under the aegis of the Direction of the Futurist Move-
ment. Therefore, his corresponding notes are almost completely useless.
 See Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 13 no. 4.2, who dates the reprint “May 1910.”
Coronelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifesti futuristi 1909 – 1910”, p. 70 no. 2, who says
“around 8 March 1910.” Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes, p. 166: “Le tract a été réimpri-
mé au moins deux fois, d’abord lorsque Bonzagni et Romani ont quitté le mouvement futuriste
et ont été remplacés par Giacomo Balla et Gino Severini.” Lista, Futurisme, p. 161: “Le placard
12 Giacomo Coronelli

composition of the group. Several documents, which I shall examine more thor-
oughly below, show that the reprint of the Manifesto dei pittori futuristi did not
take place before September 1910; there is even an off-chance that it may have
taken place a whole year later, in preparation for a new series of serate that
were to take place in the first half of 1911, and for the Prima esposizione d’arte
libera (First Free Art Exhibition) held in Milan, 1 May–30 June 1911.³⁶
Although Romolo Romani’s signature featured in the freshly printed mani-
festo, he was not to be seen onstage at the Teatro Chiarella in Turin, during
the official debut of the Futurist group of painters on 8 March 1910.³⁷ We must
assume that he left the group sometime before 19 March 1910, the date of Mostra
di bianco e nero held at the Famiglia Artistica in Milan. The Futurist painters
would later recall this exhibition of works executed in black and white (draw-
ings, engravings etc.) as “our first exhibition.”³⁸

The third Futurist propaganda mailing abroad


Romolo Romani did not exhibit at the Mostra di bianco e nero,³⁹ but his name
still featured in Les Poètes et les peintres futuristes livrent bataille dans les grands
théâtres italiens (The Futurist Poets and Painters Wage a Battle in the Great Ital-
ian Theatres), a typical Futurist leaflet featured on 28 March 1910 in the Parisian

replié édité en italien avec leurs signatures ne contient pas celle de Balla que l’on trouvera dans
la réédition qui suivit immédiatement.”
 On the Prima esposizione d’arte libera, an exhibition without jury and awards along the lines
of the Parisian Salon des Indépendants, see Crispolti: Cataloghi di esposizioni, p. 21 f. no. 1911/1;
D’Agati: “Arte libera, 1911”; Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, pp. 210 – 211; Poggi: Inventing Futurism,
pp. 102– 108.
 The serata is described in a very rare press release issued by Marinetti in March 1910, La vit-
toria dei futuristi a Torino, which served as source for most of the press reviews of the event, sur-
prisingly similar in their reporting on the event. See Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes,
pp. 176 – 178 and Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, p. 13, note 33. According to this
press release, only Marinetti, Mazza, Palazzeschi, Boccioni, Carrà, Bonzagni and Russolo were
onstage in Turin. For an analysis of the performance and its reception in the contemporary
press see Berghaus: Italian Futurism Theatre, pp. 97– 99.
 The claim is made in a very rare flyer issued for Boccion’s solo exhibition in Venice in July
1910: Noi, pittori futuristi (We, the Futurist Painters), published also in a French translation. See
Crispolti: Cataloghi di esposizioni, p. 17 no. 1910/4a; D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 71
no. 1910/54; Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes, pp. 245 – 246; Tonini: I manifesti del futur-
ismo italiano, p. 20 no. 16.1.
 See Crispolti: Cataloghi di esposizioni, p. 16 no. 1910/1.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 13

newspaper L’Intransigeant. ⁴⁰ Following a captivating starting phrase (“The land


of the dead will soon be the most lively country on Earth”), the leaflet picks up
the thread from the “famous Manifesto, published a year ago in Le Figaro” to in-
troduce Futurist activities of the first three months of 1910. A brief mention of the
“recently opened Futurist Painters Salon” (i. e. the Mostra di bianco e nero) is fol-
lowed by an account of the first serate in public theatres, with three lines de-
scribing the one in Trieste, three large paragraphs evoking the Irredentist
event in Milan and half of the text dedicated to the Turin event, where “five
young very talented painters appeared: Boccioni, Carrà, Bonzagni, Russolo
and Romani, who had just launched the Manifesto of the Futurist Painters in
Italy.”
Les Poètes et les peintres futuristes livrent bataille (Fig. 2) is a four-page, fold-
ed and unpaginated leaflet measuring 290 x 230 millimetres and has the same
format as the Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism leaflets, almost certainly re-
leased at the beginning of 1910. With its lowercase title, its layout is also remi-
niscent of the design of the almost contemporary Manifesto dei pittori futuristi,
released at the beginning of March 1910. Although this press release offers little
more than a brief summary of Futurist activities in early 1910, it is a rather im-
portant document. It was the third mailing abroad to promote Futurism (follow-
ing the Manifesto of Futurism in early February 1909 and the Second Proclama-
tion booklet in September 1909), and it was also received overseas,⁴¹ at a time
when the founder of Futurism was particularly focussed on spreading the
word abroad. I would therefore suggest that this leaflet coincided with Marinetti
sending to press the first run of Manifeste du futurisme (Publié par le “Figaro” le
20 Février 1909), which would be the first French version of the Foundation and
Manifesto of Futurism in the classic leaflet format.⁴²

 See Lista: Futurisme, pp. 89 – 90; Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes, pp. 174– 176; To-
nini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 14, no. 6.1.
 It featured, for example, in “Futurists a Strenuous Lot” in The Arkansas Gazette in Little Rock
(AR), 3 May 1910, p. 4.
 See Coronelli: “The Futurist Manifestos of 1909”, fig. 4 on p. 23. The leaflet is reproduced also
in other reference works and catalogues, but it is always uncritically dated “1909”, often specif-
ically “February 1909”, although this is only the date of the first edition of the text, not the date
when this specific leaflet was published.
14 Giacomo Coronelli

Fig. 2. Les Poètes et les peintres futuristes livrent bataille dans les grands théâtres italiens.
S. l., s. n. & s. d. [Milan, “Poesia”, April 1910]. Poligrafia Italiana–Milano. 290 x 230 mm, bi-
folium. First page.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 15

The first edition of La pittura futurista: Manifesto


tecnico and its four variant printings
A few days after the serata in Turin on 8 March 1910, the Futurist painters began
to draft La pittura futurista: Manifesto tecnico (The Futurist Painting: Technical
Manifesto). The first manifesto of the painters had been written in a rush during
the last two weeks of February 1910, resulting in “a subversive but rather vague
plea.”⁴³ The artists soon realized that they had to articulate their concept of Fu-
turist painting in much more detail, but this process caused disagreements in the
group, with the result that Romolo Romani left.⁴⁴ Soon after, Boccioni contacted
Gino Severini in Paris, who had been a good friend since the beginning of the
century, and convinced him to join the team. Thus, Boccioni managed to keep
the number of signatories the same as in the previous manifesto. Indeed, in
those early days, the newly-born group of Futurist painters could not afford to
lose any of its members. As Boccioni put it (lamenting Bonzagni’s farewell,
which also took place a couple of months later, as we shall see), “it seems
that smart people abandon us.”⁴⁵
About a month later, around mid-April 1910, the leaflet La pittura futurista:
Manifesto tecnico was printed. The date is unquestionable since Vittore Grubicy
de Dragon, in his review of the Bianco e nero exhibition in the Milanese news-
paper Il secolo of 19 April 1910, wrote that he had just received the technical
manifesto by mail.⁴⁶ The manifesto appeared in the usual folded leaflet format
measuring about 290 x 230 millimetres. The painters’ quintet is listed in alpha-
betical order (with the new entry Gino Severini to occupy the last position) and
dated “Milano, 11 Aprile 1910 | Uffici di Poesia – Via Senato, 2” (see Fig. 3 a).⁴⁷

 Salaris: Storia del futurismo, p. 38.


 The short Futurist activity of Romolo Romani (1884– 1916), a talented artist whose “psychic
symbolism” exercised a great influence on Boccioni’s States of Mind paintings, has not yet been
adequately researched. See Silvia Evangelisti’s note in Barilli et al.: Romolo Romani, pp. 24– 25,
and Schiaffini: Umberto Boccioni: Stati d’animo: Teoria e pittura, pp. 51– 56.
 Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, p. 18 no. 1.
 Grubicy de Dragon: “Pittori futuristi.” Il secolo 45:15803 (19 April 1910), p. 3, reprinted in his
Scritti scelti, pp. 17– 18 and 220, no. 24.
 Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 14 no. 9.1 (partially reproduced as facsimile), Cor-
onelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifesti futuristi 1909 – 1910”, p. 71, no. 1, and not in
Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes. D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 59,
no. 1910/37, unknowingly reproduces the leaflet of the second edition, issued from Spring
1913 onwards under the aegis of the Direction of the Futurist Movement. Therefore, his corre-
sponding notes are almost completely useless.
16 Giacomo Coronelli

Fig. 3a. La pittura futurista: Manifesto tecnico. Milano, 11 Aprile 1910. Uffici di “Poesia” – Via
Senato, 2. Poligrafia Italiana–Milano – 1548. Issued shortly before 19 April 1910. 290 x
230 mm, bifolium. First edition, first printing. Top of the first and bottom of the third page.
Fig. 3b. La pittura futurista: Manifesto tecnico. Milano, 11 Aprile 1910. Uffici di “Poesia” – Via
Senato, 2. Poligrafia Italiana–Milano 1232. Issued between September 1910 and 1911. 290 x
230 mm, bifolium. First edition, fourth and last printing. Top of the first and bottom of the
third page.

The existence of a further printing where the name of Aroldo Bonzagni was re-
placed by that of Giacomo Balla (see Fig. 3 b) has been known to Futurism schol-
ars for a while,⁴⁸ but nobody seriously investigated when this definitive version
was actually printed. When collating copies, I was able to detect three previously
unknown printings of the manifesto, each with different characteristics but all of
them still featuring Bonzagni amongst the signatories.⁴⁹ This means that they
precede the definitive printing with Balla’s name and probably left the printer’s
shop in close succession after the first printing. They introduced a few variants
but kept the same shape of printing plates (see Appendix 3, sections 1.1– 3).
Each reprint appears to have been motivated by some nontrivial changes to
the text, to which other minor variants and misprints were added. The second

 See Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, p. 196; Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 14, no. 9.2;
Coronelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifesti futuristi 1909 – 1910”, p. 71, no. 2.
 I must extend my thanks to Davide Maspero, an exceptional connoisseur of Futurist biblio-
graphy, for helping me identify most of these variants.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 17

printing (Appendix 3, section 1.2) inserts on the first page a whole new sentence
and thus increases the total lines of the text from twenty-eight to twenty-nine:
“To paint a figure, it’s not necessary to make the figure; it’s necessary to make
its atmosphere.”⁵⁰ The second printing has a number of misprints, amongst
which the conspicuous “pivisionismo” for “divisionismo” (italics in the original)
in the second line of the third page. In the signatories’ list at the bottom of
the text, the typesetter tried to add an accent to Carlo Carrà’s name (which
had been missing in the first printing), but then forgot to close the parenthesis
of the last signatory. The third printing (Appendix 3, section 1.3) corrects these
misprints, but introduces a substantial change in the list of colours featured
on the second page. Whereas the first and the second printing list brown, yellow,
red, green and blue, the third printing adds the violet as the latest colour of the
list:

At that moment, everyone will realize that it’s not brown that meanders beneath our skin
but yellow that shines, red that flames, and green, blue, and violet that voluptuously and
caressingly dance in it! How can the human face still be viewed as rosy when our life has
been undeniably doubled by our love of the night? The human face is yellow, it’s red, it’s
green, it’s blue, it’s violet. The pallor of a woman looking in the window of a jewelry shop
is more iridescent than all the prisms of the jewels that fascinate her.⁵¹

The existence of three different printings with significant changes, all realized in
close sequence in April 1910, shows that the painters paid close attention to tech-
nical details and engaged in a prolonged elaboration of the text. As events un-
folded, Aroldo Bonzagni left the group, Giacomo Balla entered the fold, and a
fourth printing of the technical manifesto was undertaken, featuring the signa-
tures of the definitive quintet of Futurist painters (see Fig. 3b). The text of this
new leaflet was entirely recomposed, using a similar but different font, with
small adjustments (see Appendix 3, section 1.4) and only one significant change:
in the paragraph where the Futurist painters draw a parallel between the “en-
lightened individual research [that] has taken the place of […] dogma in all fields
of human thought” and the “vivifying current of individual freedom” that should
“replace academic tradition” in art, the earlier printings have “vivifying scientific

 Boccioni: Futurist Painting Sculpture (Plastic Dynamism), p. 169 (the manifesto was indeed
reprinted in Boccioni’s only published book).
 Boccioni: Futurist Painting Sculpture (Plastic Dynamism), p. 170. Bold type is mine, highlight-
ing the additions of the third printing.
18 Giacomo Coronelli

current”, whereas the definitive printing uses the phrase “vivifying current of in-
dividual freedom” (see Appendix 3, section 1.4.3).⁵²
When exactly the last and definitive printing of the Manifesto tecnico della
pittura futurista took place, will probably remain an unsolved question. The
documents that I discuss below suggest that it was not done before September
1910, i. e. four months after the announcement of Giacomo Balla’s entry into
the group of Futurist painters. It may well be that this version was only printed
and distributed for the first time on the occasion of the Prima Esposizione d’arte
libera of May–June 1911.

Futurist Venice
After the Mostra di bianco e nero at the Famiglia Artistica in Milan (19 March to 3
April 1910), the main event on the Futurist agenda was the fourth serata in Na-
ples, to be held at the Mercadante Theatre on 20 April 1910. The painters’ tech-
nical manifesto had already reached the city, as a couple of well-crafted satiric
vignettes in Monsignor Perrelli (21 April 1910) demonstrate.⁵³ A mere week later,
on 27 April, the launch of the Futurist Venice flyers from the clock tower in Saint
Mark’s Square should have taken place in Venice.⁵⁴ These flyers measure about

 Although this is not the place to discuss these changes further, they prompted me to modify
the existing English translations. I mostly used the one made by Richard Shane Agin and Maria
Elena Versari, but when it comes to the original “illuminata ricerca individuale” that opens the
paragraph, I followed Lawrence Rainey’s “research” for “ricerca” (instead of “inquiry” proposed
by Shane Agin and Versari). The original “corrente scientifica” (scientific current, but also sci-
entific trend) featured in the first printings of the manifesto, indeed, matches “research” far bet-
ter than “inquiry”, as well as “enlightened” for “illuminata” (Shane Agin and Versari), on the
contrary, seems much more suited to the context than “clear-sighted” (Rainey). See, respectively,
Boccioni: Futurist Painting Sculpture (Plastic Dynamism), p. 170, and Rainey et al.: Futurism: An
Anthology, p. 65.
 See D’Ambrosio: Nuove verità crudeli, pp. 162, 189 fig. 20, 196 fig. 21– 22 and D’Ambrosio:
“Matilde Serao’s Battle with the Futurists in Naples.”
 No scholar to date was able to find evidence of this event in non-Futurist documents. Lista
takes the view that “Cette performance urbaine du groupe futuriste est relatée dans plusieurs
journaux les mois suivants, mais uniquement à partir des affirmations imprécises de Marinetti
quant à la date de l’événement et à la quantité des tracts lancés. Ainsi, on n’a jamais pu établir
s’il s’agissait d’un événement réel ou d’un événement imaginaire conçu à des fins de propa-
gande et de publicité par Marinetti.” Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes, p. 205. Stringa
judges that “non si trova alcun riscontro nei quotidiani veneziani dell’avvenimento.” Stringa:
“ ‘… l’amato e fecondo manifesto’: Cenni sulla diffusione del futurismo in Italia nel febbraio
del 1909”, p. 210 note 8. Berghaus suggested that the actual date of the event could be 25
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 19

235 x 170 millimetres and were printed on pale green paper, either with the text
in Italian (Venezia futurista), or with the same text in French (Venise futuriste),
with only one difference: in the French flyers, the list of signatories below the
text begins with the Futurist group of poets, while in the Italian flyers the Futurist
painters precede.⁵⁵

I PITTORI FUTURISTI
U. Boccioni – A. Bonzagni – C. D. Carrà
L. Russolo – G. Severini, ecc.

I POETI FUTURITI
F.T. Marinetti – Paolo Buzzi – A. Palazzeschi
E. Cavacchioli – Armando Mazza
Libero Altomare
Luciano Folgore – Giuseppe Carrieri, ecc.

The flyers are undated, but a couple of weeks later Marinetti distributed a narrow
and long press release in Italian, with the same title as the flyer, Venezia futurista
(see Fig. 4a). Here, the text of the flyer is preceded by the following address to
editors:

Dear Colleague, | Please leave aside all preconceptions about Futurism and let me know, in
your newspaper or by letter, whether you approve of our most recent gesture: | On 27 April,
the Futurist painters Boccioni, Bonzagni, Carrà and Russolo, as well as the Futurist poets
Marinetti, Armando Mazza and Aldo Palazzeschi, went to Venice, climbed the Clock
Tower, and from there, amidst the tumultuous flights of frightened pigeons, launched
one hundred thousand flyers, in Italian and French, to the agitation and shrieking aston-
ishment of the dense crowd in Piazza San Marco.⁵⁶

April, because the day of the “Festa di San Marco” would have convened a good crowd in the
square. All of these, however, remain mere hypothesis until a thorough research in local news-
papers of April 1910 will be carried out.
 Both flyers are reproduced in the original by D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 61
nos. 1910/39 and 40. Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 18, no. 11.2 and Lista: Le Futur-
isme: Textes et manifestes, p. 205 reproduce the French flyer. Passerini et al.: Aroldo Bonzagni e il
suo tempo, pp. 60 – 61, reproduces the Italian flyer.
 “Caro Collega, | Vogliate lasciare da parte ogni preconcetto intorno al Futurismo e risponder-
mi, vi prego, nel vostro giornale o per lettera, se approvate il nostro gesto più recente: | Il giorno
27 aprile, i pittori futuristi Boccioni, Bonzagni, Carrà e Russolo, e i poeti futuristi Marinetti, Ar-
mando Mazza e Aldo Palazzeschi, recatisi a Venezia, salirono sulla Torre dell’Orologio, e di là,
fra i voli tumultuosi dei colombi spaventati, lanciarono sull’agitazione e lo stupore urlante della
densa folla che gremiva la Piazza San Marco, centomila manifesti, in italiano e in francese, così
concepiti.”
20 Giacomo Coronelli

Below the diatribe against Venetian traditionalism (“We turn our backs on the
ancient Venice, worn out and brought to ruin by centuries of pleasure seek-
ing […]”)⁵⁷ and the signatures, a second address to the editors says:

At eight o’clock in the evening, the Futurists put the whole city in turmoil again, with re-
peated throwing of their manifestos in the middle of the crowd gathered in St Mark’s Square
to hear the city music. | If you do not approve of this act of ours, we will have to count you
among the great herd of passétists in Italy, fortunately destined to be overwhelmed by our
victorious expansion. | Thanking you in advance for your reply, I greet you. | F. T. MAR1NET-
TI | Director of “POESIA”.⁵⁸

The Venezia futurista press release, sent out around 15 May 1910,⁵⁹ is the only
Futurist document featuring the date and the details of the event. It is rare nowa-
days, often unknown to scholars or mistaken⁶⁰ for the French press release Ven-
ise futuriste (see Fig. 4b), sent out a month later⁶¹ and featuring some small but

 Marinetti: Critical Writings, p. 165. “Noi ripudiamo l’antica Venezia, estenuata e sfatta da vol-
uttà secolari.” Teoria e invenzione futurista, 1st edn p. 510, 2nd edn p. 585.
 “Alle otto di sera, i Futuristi mettevano di nuovo in subbuglio l’intera città, con innumerevoli
getti di loro manifesti in mezzo alla folla adunata in Piazza San Marco a udire la musica citta-
dina. | Se voi non approverete questo nostro atto, dovremo annoverarvi nella grande mandra dei
Passatisti d’Italia, fortunatamente destinata ad essere sopraffatta dal nostro dilagare vittorioso. |
Ringraziandovi anticipatamente della risposta, vi saluto. | F.T. MARINETTI | Direttore di ‘Poe-
sia’.”
 See Francesco Cangiullo’s letter and subsequent article in L’allegria 1:4 (15 May 1910), repro-
duced in D’Ambrosio: Nuove verità crudeli, pp. 242– 243 and Marinetti and Cangiullo: Lettere
(1910 – 1943), p. 162, no. 2. The Davide Maspero Collection in Milan contains a copy of the
press release that still preserves the original envelope, addressed to the director of Giornale di
Piacenza. It carries a postal stamp dated 14 May 1910 and is headed “Poesia: Rassegna Interna-
zionale | Direttore: F.T. Marinetti | Milano – Via Senato, 2”.
 The document is missing from D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici and it is incorrectly de-
scribed by Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 18, no. 11.3, as a mere Italian version of the
French press release. See also the mistaken entry in Cammarota: Filippo Tommaso Marinetti:
Bibliografia, p. 143, no. 9 and Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes, p. 206.
 The Parisian Journal des débats politiques et littéraires discussed the manifesto on 14 June
1910, and Comœdia the day after, with a note from the editor-in-chief Gaston de Pawlowski: “Ro-
mantiques attardés.” Two days later, Comœdia hosted the full text of the press release as the
opening piece in the header section on its third page, with the title Venise futuriste and three
satirical drawings by André Warnod (see Milan: “André Warnod’s Illustration of Marinetti’s ‘Fu-
turist Speech to the Venetians’”). The original French press release is rare, and I cannot quote a
reference book in which one could find it reproduced in the original format, but the text is well
known. See Lista: Le Futurisme: Textes et manifestes, pp. 206 – 207. Interestingly, instead of the
press release itself, D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 62, no. 1910/41, reproduces the type-
written draft from the Severini Papers held at MART, Rovereto, which is precisely quoted and
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 21

Fig. 4a. Venezia futurista. F. T. Marinetti. Direttore di “Poesia”. Via Senato 2 – Milano. Poli-
grafia Italiana–Milano. Issued shortly before 15 May 1910. 340 x 145 mm, 1 leaf. Fig. 4b.
Venise futuriste. F. T. Marinetti. Directeur de “Poesia”. Via Senato 2 – Milano. Poligrafia Italia-
na–Milano. Issued shortly before 15 June 1910. 440 x 145 mm, 1 leaf.
22 Giacomo Coronelli

crucial changes: “On 27 April” becomes “Tout récemment” (fairly recently); Bon-
zagni disappeares from the list of Futurist painters who supposedly climbed the
clock tower, and Paolo Buzzi shows up amongst the Futurist poets involved in
the action; “one hundred thousand flyers” become “200,000 multicoloured fly-
ers” that frightened “the affable and home-loving pigeons” so much “that they
deserted for several days their beautiful marble lace nests.” The pigeon motif,
which was already present in the Italian press release, was considerably elabo-
rated here.
In the Venise futuriste press release, the text of the manifesto is also slightly
changed and expanded. In particular, a new paragraph introduces an aggressive
political argument that is absent from the version issued in the flyers and in the
Italian press release Venezia futurista:

We wish to cure and begin the healing process of this putrescent city, this magnificent car-
buncle from the past. We want to bring the Venetian people back to life, to ennoble them,
fallen as they are from their former greatness, stupefied by a sickening spinelessness and
humiliated by their habitual, shady little businesses. We wish to prepare the birth of an in-
dustrial and military Venice which can brave and confront on the Adriatic Sea our greatest
enemy: Austria.⁶²

It is interesting to note that this strongly belligerent and Irredentist statement


would remain unknown to the Italian public until the first resumption of the
manifesto in 1914, which I shall address below. The signatories of the manifesto
in the Venise futuriste press release were the same as in the French version of the
flyer, except for Aroldo Bonzagni, who is missing from the group of Futurist
painters. In July 1910, it was the turn of another press release, entitled Futurist
Venice,⁶³ which featured a faithful rendition of the French text in poor English.
The longer version in the French and English press releases would later become
the definitive form of the manifesto, first presented in Le Futurisme, the antology
published by Sansot in Paris in the summer of 1911. It goes under the title Pre-

fully transcribed by Rovati in Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, pp. 194– 195, note 5. The text shows no
variation from the printed text.
 As long as the text was congruent, i. e. until the penultimate sentence, I follow the transla-
tion in Marinetti: Critical Writings, p. 165.
 The English press release is reproduced in D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 62,
no. 1910/42 and Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, p. 18, no. 11.5. It is mentioned in the
London Daily Express of 7 July 1910 (see Wood: “ ‘On or about December 1910’: F.T. Marinetti’s
Onslaught on London and Recursive Structures in Modernism”, p. 143) but also in The Manches-
ter Guardian of 6 July 1910. It reached the US in mid-July, being described in many newspapers,
amongst which the St. Luis Post Dispatch of 16 July 1910, The Argonaut in San Francisco on 23
July 1910 and eventually the renowned The New York Times on 24 July 1910.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 23

mier Manifeste futuriste aux Vénitiens, and the signatories’ list contains the
whole membership of the Direction of the Futurist Movement, introduced for
the first time in this book.
In the following years, Futurist propaganda added a great deal of confusion
to the debate by referring to the Venice manifesto by diverging titles and dates, a
mystification that endures in modern studies. At the end of 1913, i. e. three years
after its launch, the longer version of Futurist Venice was translated for the first
Italian anthology of Futurist manifestos, I manifesti del futurismo (The Manifes-
tos of Futurism), published under the aegis of Lacerba. It carried the title Contro
Venezia passatista (Against Traditionalist Venice),⁶⁴ was dated 27 April 1910, and
after the text of the manifesto, on the following page, seemingly without inter-
ruption, a note in italics – printed for the first time here – states that:

On 8 July 1910, 800,000 leaflets containing the manifesto were hurled by the Futurist poets
and painters from the top of the Clock Tower onto the crowds returning from the Lido. Thus
began the campaign which, for three years, the Futurist waged against traditionalist Venice.
The following speech against the Venetians, extemporized by Marinetti at the Fenice The-
ater, provoked a terrible battle. The Futurist were whistled at while the traditionalist were
beaten up. The Futurist painters Boccioni, Russolo and Carrà punctuated this speech with
many resounding slaps. The fist of the Futurist poet Armando Mazza, who is also an athlete,
stays fixed in the memory.⁶⁵

This text is the primary source for the date “8 July”, seemingly coming out of the
blue at the end of 1913. The note in italics on page 33 of the Lacerba’s anthology
serves as a link between Futurist Venice and another manifesto, Futurist Speech
to the Venetians, which is seamlessly printed after the note. Futurist sources state
that the Speech to the Venetians was addressed on the occasion of the Futurist
serate in Venice and Padua at the beginning of August 1910. But the first version

 The new title was first adopted in the list of manifestos printed on the back of Carrà’s leaflet
The Painting of Sounds, Noises, Smells, dated 11 August 1913. See Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo
italiano, p. 42, no. 62 and p. 43 (facsimile). This very first catalogue of Futurist manifestos was
repeated in a few other leaflets and eventually systematized in the Lacerba anthology.
 Marinetti: Critical Writings, p. 166. The Lacerba anthology is the usual source of the text in
anthologies such as De Maria’s Teoria e invenzione futurista, Berghaus’ Critical Writings and
Rainey et al.: Futurism: An Anthology. Incidentally, in the Lacerba anthology, the manifesto is
attributed only to Marinetti, Boccioni, Carrà and Russolo. It contains a couple of minor varia-
tions to the French and English press releases of 1910 (and to Le Futurisme, 1911). The Irrendent-
ist argument is once again softened, omitting the reference to Austria as the “greatest enemy” for
a “Venice which can dominate the Adriatic, this great Italian lake.”
24 Giacomo Coronelli

of the text can be found in a leaflet entitled Discours futuriste aux Vénitiens, men-
tioned by the French press only in the late autumn of 1910.⁶⁶
The same combination of Futurist Venice and Futurist Speech to the Vene-
tians, under the heading “La battaglia di Venezia”, was included in the anthol-
ogy Guerra sola igiene del mondo (War the Sole Cleanser of the World), released
on the eve of Italy’s declaration of war on the Austro-Hungarian Empire (25 May
1915). Here, the date “8 July 1910” is moved to the beginning, before the two
textes. Futurist Venice seamlessy follows with all the new features introduced
in the Lacerba anthology, except for the title which now becomes Manifesto fu-
turista ai veneziani (Futurist Manifesto to the Venetians). The previously featured
date “27 April 1910” is now omitted.
In 1915, the corpus of Futurist texts underwent a process of rationalization,
with little regard to historical accuracy. Futurist Venice – which for a certain time
was also called Against Traditionalist Venice – was transformed into Futurist
Manifesto to the Venetians. Two events which originally happened several
months apart (if they happened at all!) were now combined under a single
date, “8 July 1910”, invented in 1913 and absent from all the records in 1910.⁶⁷
They now feature under a single heading as “The Battle of Venice.” It follows
from these informations that Futurist Venice ⁄ Against Traditional Venice ⁄ Futurist
Manifesto to the Venetians, as well as the dates 27 April and 8 July 1910, refer to
the same text and to the same – alleged – event. Scholars should be aware of
these conflicting titles and dates, and avoid future confusion on a subject that
is already opaque in itself.

The first edition of the Manifeste des peintres


futuristes and its variant reprint
Bonzagni’s name still featured in the poster for the serata in the Mercadante The-
atre in Naples,⁶⁸ in the Venetian flyers and in the following Venezia futurista
press release, but it is likely that he had already left the group of Futurist paint-

 Clearly, we are dealing with another case here where it is difficult to discern facts from prop-
aganda and to establish a clear chronology of events. Anyhow, it will be the subject of a thor-
ough examination in the third instalment of my essay, covering late 1910 and 1911.
 See Berghaus: Italian Futurist Theatre, p. 82, note 35: “I have checked four Venetian news-
papers for the months June to August [1910] and have not found any mention of this event!
This is all the more astonishing, because during the summer months the news-hungry journal-
ists had little to report on and filled the columns with the most insignificant banalities.”
 Reproduced in D’Ambrosio: Nuove verità crudeli, p. 163 fig. 14.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 25

ers in the week between 20 and 27 April 1910. We know about this course of
events thanks to a letter Boccioni wrote to Severini at the end of April:

Dear Gino, I am writing to you secretly (!) to hear your opinion on who can still sign our
manifesto […] We completely trust your judgment, but I must warn you that the signatures
must be of young people absolutely convinced of what the manifesto proclaims […] Mari-
netti has sent the manifesto herewith attached to all the writers, newspapers, magazines,
etc. of the world. However, it is going to be reprinted, with the signatures you think appro-
priate – Once again, on behalf of all of us, I plead you to be exacting in your choice – You
see that already one (Bonzagni) no longer signs the manifesto, because he is not convinced
of Divisionism….. This is very annoying because it makes the imbeciles believe that smart
people abandon us!!!.. […] Ciao. Distribute the manifesto everywhere.⁶⁹

According to Federica Rovati’s convincing reconstruction of Boccioni’s biogra-


phy, the letter was written three months earlier than had previously been
thought,⁷⁰ i. e. shortly after the alleged flyer action on San Mark’s Square in Ven-
ice. Incidentally, it is intriguing to note that Divisionism, which was the reason of
Bonzagni’s defection in Boccioni’s word, was spelled “pivisionismo” in the sec-
ond printing of La pittura futurista: Manifesto tecnico (see above and below, Ap-
pendix 3, section 1.2.2), an error that possibly drew even more attention to that
matter.⁷¹
At this point, events come thick and fast, in the wake of or interconnected to
the launch of several new manifesto leaflets. At the end of April, enclosed in the

 “Caro Gino, ti scrivo per chiedere segretamente (!) il tuo giudizio su chi può ancora firmare il
manifesto nostro […] Noi ci fidiamo completamente del tuo giudizio ma ti debbo avvertire che le
firme devono essere di giovani assolutamente convinti di ciò che il manifesto afferma – […] Ma-
rinetti ha mandato a tutti i letterati, giornali, riviste ecc del mondo il manifesto qui unito del
quale sarà fatta però una ristampa in cui si potranno aggiungere le firme che credi opportune –
Mi raccomando di nuovo a nome di tutti la massima severità nella scelta – Tu vedi che già uno
(il Bonzagni) non firma più il manifesto perché non è convinto del divisionismo….. Questo fatto è
noiosissimo perché dà a credere agli imbecilli che… gl’intelligenti ci abbandonino!!!.. […] Ciao.
Spargi da per tutto il manifesto.” Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, no. 1, pp. 17– 18.
 See Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, p. 193. After the partial, non-literal and undated quotations in
Severini: Tutta la vita di un pittore, pp. 116 – 117, the letter was first published by Drudi Gambillo
and Fiori: Archivi del futurismo, pp. 231– 232 with the wrong conjectural date “post 1 August
1910”, and then repeated in subsequent studies on the subject.
 Sassoli de’ Bianchi Strozzi: “Secessionista, futurista, espressionista: Aroldo Bonzagni”,
pp. 14– 16, summarizes the hypothetical reasons for Bonzagni’s departure as formulated by
scholars to date: unease with the public hullabaloo about Futurism; the dominant position of
Divisionism in Boccioni’s thinking; the uncritical admiration of technology and urbanism; mil-
itarism and bellicism. Actually, Bonzagni’s brief Futurist career, as well as Romani’s, still awaits
a thorough investigation. See also Giuseppe Virelli’s report “Aroldo Bonzagni and His (almost)
Futurist Epoch” in this volume of the yearbook.
26 Giacomo Coronelli

aforementioned letter, Boccioni sent Severini a typewritten draft of the French


press release Venise futuriste,⁷² announcing that it was going to be reprinted.
In the first half of May, Marinetti had a pivotal leaflet printed, the Manifeste
des peintres futuristes, which merged the two manifestos of the Futurist painters
into a single, in part original, French text, with the same date (11 April 1910) as
La pittura futurista: Manifesto tecnico. ⁷³ Textual details of the French manifesto
show that it stemmed from the third printing of La pittura futurista: Manifesto
tecnico: it refers to “violet” in the colour list and speaks of “le courant vivifica-
teur de la science” (vivifying scientific current) instead of the “vivifying current
of individual freedom” introduced in the fourth and latest printing (see Appendix
3, sections 1.3.2 and 1.4.3). This demonstrates that the fourth, definitive printing
of the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting, featuring – amongst other var-
iants – the name of Balla in place of Bonzagni, was not yet conceived in May
1910.
On 17 May 1910, a mere couple of days after Cangiullo acknowledged the re-
ceipt of the Italian press release Venezia futurista (still featuring Aroldo Bonza-
gni’s signature rather than that of Giacomo Balla), L’Intransigeant in Paris re-
ported on the Manifeste des peintres futuristes. The following day, Comœdia
published the full text with cartoons by André Warnod. The significant fact is
that the French version of the manifestos carried now the five definitive signa-
tures, with Giacomo Balla in place of Aroldo Bonzagni:

After the poets, here are the Futurist painters. There are five: Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carrà,
Luigi Russolo, from Milan, Giacomo Balla, from Rome, and Gino Severini, from Paris; and
they launch a manifesto, published by Poesia, the magazine of the poet F.T. Marinetti.⁷⁴

Rovati, the editor of Boccioni’s correspondence, writes that Severini’s letter to


Marinetti of 17 May “certifies Balla’s entrance into the Futurist movement to re-

 D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 62, no. 1910/41 (facsimile) and Boccioni: Lettere fu-
turiste, pp. 194– 195, note 5 (full transcription).
 Tonini: I manifesti del futurismo italiano, pp. 15 – 16, no. 9.3 (reproduced as facsimile); Coro-
nelli: “Spigolature bibliografiche sui manifesti futuristi 1909 – 1910”, p. 71, no. 3; Lista: Le Futur-
isme: Textes et manifestes, pp. 198 – 202. D’Ambrosio: Manifesti programmatici, p. 60, no. 1910/38
unknowingly reproduces the leaflet of the second edition, issued from spring 1913 onwards
under the aegis of the Direction of the Futurist Movement.
 “Après les poètes, voici les peintres futuristes. Ils sont cinq: Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carrà,
Luigi Russolo, de Milan, Giacomo Balla, de Rome, et Gino Severini, de Paris; et ils lancent un
manifeste, édité par la revue Poésie, du poète F.-T. Marinetti.” L’intransigeant 30:10898 (17
May 1910), p. 2, col. 4.
The Futurist Manifestos of Early 1910: Dates and Editions Reconsidered 27

place Bonzagni.”⁷⁵ In actual fact, it was the Manifeste des peintres futuristes that
offered for the first time clear evidence for Balla’s inclusion in the group; Seve-
rini’s letter only confirms, once again, the arrival of the leaflet in France around
17 May (i. e. the date when it was reported on in L’Intransigeant). This may seem a
minor adjustment in the chronology of historical sources, but it corrects Rovati’s
otherwise fairly accurate chronology of Boccioni’s life between 1910 and 1916.
Amongst the events of 1910, it lists the serate and exhibitions, the Manifesto
dei pittori futuristi, La pittura futurista: Manifesto tecnico and Venise futuriste
(sic, named as in the French version), but fails to mention the Manifeste des pein-
tres futuristes. ⁷⁶
Rovati’s edition of Boccioni’s correspondence is a precious and extremely
useful scholarly work concerning Futurism’s early phase, but also a telling dem-
onstration of the errors that have plagued Futurism Studies hitherto: manifestos
are considered merely as texts rather than print products released at a specific
moment of time for a particular purpose, usually as leaflets in a standardized
format. As my research shows, these print items, or bibliographical objects,
were nearly all subject to variant printings, and these variants tell a revealing
story about what went on in the Futurist group in its early days of existence.
However, different printings of the same leaflet are difficult to identify and
even harder to date. Until a comprehensive survey of all surviving copies in libra-
ries and archives has been carried out, our knowledge of these manifestos must
be considered provisional. Even the impressive collection published by D’Am-
brosio in the series Nuovi archivi del futurismo shows no awareness of differences
between manifestos as texts and printed matter, thus ignoring all the significant
variants in content and target readership.⁷⁷
Documents show that the decision to replace Aroldo Bonzagni with Giacomo
Balla was taken within the span of only a few days, probably between the end of
April and 10 May. It is necessary to keep in mind that, at the same time, Marinetti
rushed the Venezia futurista press releases into press, still with Bonzagni rather
than Balla’s name on them, and immediately afterwards gave the printer the

 Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, p. 193, referring to the letter sent by Severini to Marinetti, dated
Civray 17 May 1910 and published in Hanson: “Marinetti Papers: Letters and Postcards from Gino
Severini to F.T. Marinetti, 1910 – 1915”, p. 135: “Sono felicissimo che Balla abbia firmato il mani-
festo.”
 See Boccioni: Lettere futuriste, pp. 351– 352.
 See above, notes 34, 47 and 73, in which I mention three cases in D’Ambrosio: Manifesti pro-
grammatici where leaflets of the second edition, published from 1913 onwards, are reproduced in
place of the first editions of 1910. Seen from a philological and bibliographical perspective,
D’Ambrosio’s edition must be treated with great caution.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
número dels Cantons fins al de dinou. Los novament entrats foren:
Sant Gall, los Grisons, Argovia, Turgovia, Tessino, y Vaud. Alguns
d’aquestos formavan ja part de la Suissa com payssos subjectes ó
Territoris, quedant lliberats y elevats á la categoria d’Estats
autónoms en l’Acta de mediació, que va durar fins á la cayguda del
mediador.

6é· La Confederació dels vint y dos Cantons, que se establí al venir en


1815 la restauració á tot Europa. Als Cantons de l’Acta de mediació
van afegirshi lo Valais, lo principat de Neuchatel y Ginevra.

7é· L’Estat compost ó federatiu, creat per la Constitució federal de


1848, revisada en 1874, y havent sufert més tart algunas petitas
modificacions. En aquesta nova forma no va ferse cap innovació
territorial, si no’s conta com tal la transformació del principat de
Neuchatel, que dependia de la corona de Prusia, en república lliure,
reconeguda com á tal en 1857 per lo que era son príncep.

Avuy, donchs, la Confederació suissa es un Estat compost, organisat


en lo substancial de una manera análoga á la Unió americana. Las
atribucions de la soberania están distribuhidas entre los Estats
particulars y llur conjunt, exercint aquest per delegació las que te
confiadas, y disfrutant aquells per dret originari totas las de que no
s’han després. La distribució está feta baix la mateixa base que la
americana, si be que las autoritats generals suissas gosa pot ser de
mes atribucions, pero de menys medis de acció pera exercirlas
directament.

En lo poder federal se distingeixen tres classes de autoritats, que no


están tant desllindadas las unas de las altras com en los Estats Units.
La Assamblea federal suissa, ademés de ser la autoritat llegislativa,
es superior baix certs punts de vista de las executiva y judicial.

La Assamblea federal está formada per dos cossos ó Cámaras, com la


americana. Lo que representa’ls interessos generals de tota la
Confederació, s’anomena Consell nacional; la que representa la
autonomía dels Cantons confederats, porta’l nom de Consell dels
Estats. Lo primer se compón de diputats elegits pel poble, á rahó
d’un per cada vint mil habitants ó fracció que passi de deu mil, y llur
cárrech dura tres anys. Lo segón está format per quaranta quatre
diputats dels Cantons, dos per cada un, xich ó gran, elegits en lo
modo y forma que sa Constitució particular determina, y durant llurs
funcions lo temps que cada Cantó fixa. Los dos Consells son iguals en
atribucions, y una lley no té forsa obligatoria si nó es aprobada per
los dos.

La autoritat executiva y administrativa es exercida per lo Consell


federal, format per set membres, elegits cada tres anys per los dos
cossos de la Assamblea federal reunits pera l’objecte. Cada membre
té senyalat un departament pera la preparació dels assumptos, que
són resolts en consell. Lo President y’l Vice-president del Consell són
nombrats cada any per la Assamblea de entre’ls membres del meteix
y són respectivament President y Vice-president de la Confederació.
Lo cárrech, empero, no’ls lliura de tenir encarregat un departament,
com los demés consellers.

La autoritat judicial está confiada al Tribunal federal, compost de


nou membres y altres tants suplents, elegits per l’Assamblea reunida,
y quins cárrechs duran sis anys. Cada dos, l’Assamblea designa
d’entre’ls membres lo President y Vice-president del Tribunal.

La resenya que acabem de fer de la organisació dels poders generals


suissos, diu ben clar quins son los objectes que’s proposa la
Confederació en los nostres temps. Son ideal es lo perfeccionament
de las prácticas democráticas, y per lo tant no es d’extranyar, que la
meteixa Assamblea, que més que autoritat llegislativa es baix certs
punts de vista una Convenció, estigui subjecta en l’exercici de sas
funcions propias á la fiscalisació y vigilancia del poble. Tota lley ó
decret federal que no són de carácter urgent declarat, no entran en
vigor fins noranta dias després de publicats. Si durant aquest terme
vuit Cantons ó trenta mil ciutadans electors de tota la Suissa
demanan baix llurs firmas que la lley sigui objecte del Referendum,
se l’ha de subjectar á votació popular pera la acceptació ó no
acceptació. Si la majoría dels votants se pronuncia en contra, la lley
queda retirada. Sóls entra en vigor, quan durant los noranta dias no’s
demana lo Referendum, ó quan lo resultat de la votació li ha sigut
favorable.

La organisació interior dels Cantons es eminentment variada, si be


que en general poden ser classificats en tres classes ó grupos. Hi ha
Cantons de democracia pura, en los quals lo poder llegislatiu resideix
en lo poble reunit en Landsgemeinde (Reunió de la terra). Lo dia
marcat en la Constitució, tots los ciutadans actius se reuneixen,
ordinariament al aire lliure, al mitj del camp ó al repeu de una
montanya, y allí deliberan y votan las lleys que han de regir al Cantó.
Hi ha Cantons de gobern representatiu, basat en las reglas propias
d’aquest sistema en los temps actuals, y n’hi ha de gobern intermedi,
consistent en que, fentse las lleys per un cos de representants, la
totalitat del poble intervé directament en llur aprobació. En la
segona part d’aquest llibre vam indicar en que consistia lo Veto, lo
Referendum, la Iniciativa, y’l dret de revocar los Consells llegislatius
ó executius: que tals són los medis que s’emplean en los Cantons de
que’ns ocupem pera donar al poble intervenció directa en la
confecció de la lley.

Inútil es dir que en Suissa, lo meteix que en la Unió americana, la


excentralisació no’s detura en la que forma la base del sistema. Dins
de cada Cantó se manifestan cent varietats, que son atesas y
respectadas, lograntse aixis que la vida y’l moviment se reparteixin
per tot lo pays.

A Suissa, donchs, la organisació particularista dona los meteixos


bons resultats que per tot arreu ahon l’Estat s’hi basa. Los Cantons
que forman la Confederació han volgut per medi de la unió
perfeccionar las prácticas de la democracia, y ho han alcansat fins al
punt que diuhen las institucions que acabem de indicar. Y ¡cosa
admirable! Tot cercant la perfecció de la democracia, ó sigui del
gobern de las majorías, los suissos han trobat la llibertat, que’ls
resulta del conjunt de garantías y limitacions mutuas entre totas las
manifestacions del poder: garantías y limitacions, que en llur exercici
han produhit l’armonía entre los interessos col·lectius y’ls
individuals.

No volem repetir lo que acabem d’escriure en lo llibre á que hem


aludit en un dels passats capitols. Al nostre estudi comparatiu entre
la Confederació suissa y la Unió americana remetem als que desitjin
datos més complets sobre una materia, que no podem fer més que
tocar per damunt en aquesta part del nostre travall.

Pera completar lo capítol, hem de dir quatre paraulas sobre la


organisació de algunas de las repúblicas hispano-americanas. Entre
ellas, la Argentina, Méxich, Venezuela, Colombia y pocas més, ó
portan lo nom de federals, ó tenen alguna institució que tira cap al
sistema particularista.

Lo federalisme de las repúblicas hispano-americanas no es sinó un


reflexo de la organisació nort-americana, mal aplicada en general, y
desnaturalisada en moltas de las Constitucions de aquellas
repúblicas. No han trovat pas encara lo centre. Fins ara han estat
lluytant constantment pera donarse una organisació definitiva, y la
historia de moltas d’ellas pot condensarse en la enumeració dels
pronunciaments y revoltas.

Aixó no vol dir que no hagin avansat camí. Méxich, per exemple, y la
Argentina están avuy prosperant de una manera notable. Han lograt
establir certa regularitat en la designació dels funcionaris superiors,
la que era causa de totas las perturbacions á que estavan subjectas, y
la organisació particularista, copiada y tot, y mal aplicada, los
impulsa cap al avens.

A las repúblicas hispano-americanas los ha fet fins ara molta falta


l’element histórich pera basarhi lo federalisme. Al conquistarse la
independencia, sortiren de la dominació espanyola, absorvent y
centralisadora lo meteix en las Colonias que en la Metrópoli. La
divisió en Estats, per lo tant, ha degut ferse en ellas de una manera
arbitraria, á diferencia dels Estats Units, que degueren pendre per
base del federalisme las Colonias ab vida propia que per llur unió van
establirlo. Lo moll de la organisació nort-americana lo forman los
tretze Estats primitius, veritables personalitats jurídicas é históricas,
y á llur antorn s’han anat creant nous Estats, los quals, si be al naixer
no tenian personalitat, ha anat adquirintla á mida que s’han creat
interessos especials als meteixos. L’esperit regional de las Colonias
británicas que van unirse pera formar la Confederació, ha fet molta
falta á las repúblicas de que’ns estem ocupant.

No farem un resúmen detallat de las Constitucions que las regeixen,


puig l’hem fet ja de la que’ls ha servit de model, que han copiat
espatllantlo. Nos reduhirem á dir quatre paraulas sobre Méxich y la
Argentina, que són no sóls las més importants sinó també las que en
aquestos darrers temps, y entre las repúblicas de orígen Espanyol,
més fixesa han lograt dins de la organisació més ó menys
perfectament federativa de que disfrutan.

Méxich, la més poblada de las nacions americanas d’orígen espanyol,


puig passa de deu milions d’habitants, es una Confederació de vint y
set Estats, un Districte federal y un Territori. La Constitució actual
fou feta l’any 1857, y si be als pochs mesos de nascuda ja va ser
arraconada per las dictaduras de Comonfort y de Juarez, essent
luego tirada obertament á terra per l’imperi de Maximiliá, imposat
per las armas francesas, al ser executat l’emperador y destruhit
l’imperi en 1867, lo vencedor Juarez va restablir la dita Constitució
que ha seguit estant en vigor fins ara, exepció feta d’alguns curts
períodos de guerra civil. Desde son restabliment, la Constitució ha
sufert algunas modificacions per medi de quatre actes de reforma,
dels quals lo mes important es lo de Setembre de 1873, que va
separar la Iglesia del Estat.

Lo principal defecte de la Constitució mexicana es que no desllinda


clarament las atribucions que s’encarregan als poders generals, que
de fet invadeixen tots los terrenos que be’ls semblan. Los poders
federals se componen d’un Congrés llegislatiu copiat del dels Estats
Units, ab Senat y Cámara de representants; d’un President,
encarnació del poder executiu, nombrat per elecció de segón grau, y
de Tribunals Suprem, de districte y de circuit, dels quals lo primer se
forma de magistrats designats per elecció indirecta de segon grau y
quinas funcions duran sis anys.

La Confederació Argentina, altra de las agrupacions de orígen


español que mes prosperan, y quina població de més de tres milions
d’habitants va creixent de dia en dia, gracias no sols als recursos del
pays, sinó també á la incessant inmigració que de totas las nacions de
Europa se dirigeix á sas platjas, está formada per catorze Estats,
cuatre Territoris y’l Districte federal en que la capital ha sigut
darrerament convertida. La Constitució actual es la meteixa que va
ferse en 1853, reformada radicalment en 1860, y habent desde
aquesta fetxa sufert algunas modificacions menys importants. La
organisació dels poders federals es la meteixa que als Estats Units, ab
lleugeras variants. Un Congrés, format per un Senat y una Cámara;
un President, designat per elecció indirecta, y un Tribunal Suprem,
quals magistrats son nombrats pel President ab lo consentiment del
Senat y exerceixen llurs cárrechs mentres observin bona conducta,
són las autoritats generals que estableix la Constitució. Aquesta, al
fer la distribució de las atribucions de la soberanía, se separa de son
model Nort-americá, y converteix la Confederació en un Estat quasi
unitari, si be que decentralisat. En efecte, en son article 67, entre
moltas altras importantíssimas atribucions que confereix al Congrés
general, hi ha la de “fer un códich civil, un de comers, un de penal y
un de minas”, y encara que lo meteix article segueixi dihent, que "tals
códichs no podrán alterar las jurisdiccions locals, corresponent llur
aplicació als tribunals federals ó provincials, segons que las personas
ó las cosas caiguin baix la una ó l’altra jurisdicció, no es menys cert
que la organisació federativa queda desnaturalisada.

Mes, sigui com sigui, la generalitat de las repúblicas hispano-


americanas ha entrat més ó menys perfectament en la via del
particularisme, y’n tocan ja certs resultats favorables, que anirán
essent millors de dia en dia. Avuy per avuy, Mexich té ja construhits
4,500 kilómetres de camí de ferro y 27,000 de fils telegráfichs, y la
Argentina disposa ja ó está á punt de disposar, de 4,000 kilómetres
dels primers y d’una xarxa de més de 15,000 dels segons: datos que
presentem sóls com indici de l’activitat que en tots los rams s’ha
despertat en aquells payssos.

Las repúblicas hispano-americanas han comensat á assentarse, y


lliures ja en bona part dels afanys que’ls ha produhit la lluyta que
desde llur independencia han hagut de sostenir pera dotar de
institucions novas á aquells Estats sens historia, y pera esborrar los
tristos efectes de la dominació castellana, están en lo bon camí que’ls
portará á fer alguna cosa de profit pera la civilisació general. No cal
fer cas dels judicis apassionats que’s fan d’aquells payssos per los que
encara anyoran la explotació de que en altres temps los feyan
víctimas. Per llur fortuna, las repúblicas de que’ns ocupem, están
situadas en uns continents en los que predomina la influencia
particularista. Deixemlas que’s desenrotllin, y si han comensat per
imitacions y copias de la Constitució nort-americana, encara que
espatllantla y desnaturalisantla, no tardarán tal vegada á imprimirhi
lo sagell de llur personalitat. ¿Qui sap, com dihem en un altre capítol,
si la missió histórica d’aquells pobles jóvens y bulliciosos se
condensa en arrivar á la síntessis que ha de armonisar
l’individualisme anglo-saxo ab l’autoritarisme igualatari llatí? Als
esforsos fets per las repúblicas hispano-americanas la civilisació deu
ja que en lo nou món no s’hi puguin arrelar institucions caducas.
Després de la negació vindrá l’afirmació. Tancada la porta á la
monarquía, la república no podrá viure sino respirant los purs aires
de la llibertat y del particularisme.
Capitol V.
Solucions espanyolas
Las solucions espanyolas podrán ser monárquicas ó republicanas.–
Solucions monárquicas en general.– Existencia de una dinastia nacional y
de cap de regional.– Impossibilitat práctica del sistema alemany.– Solusions
possibles.– Llas personal per la corona, Confederació y Estat compost.–
Antecedents histórichs de las nostras Corts.– Diéta general formada per las
delegacions de aquestas.– Poder executiu regional. Diferents formas que
pot pendre.– Punts de organisació comuns á las solucions monárquicas y
republicanas.– Las grans regions son las pedras angulars del edifici.–
Sistema dualista.– Régimen concordatari.– Solucions republicanas.– Utilitat
de comensar per una Confederació pera arrivar més tart al Estat compost.–
Diéta general.– Vigor del esperit regional.– Enfortiment del afecte de patria.

Hem arrivat ja als capítols finals. En lo present y en lo que lo seguirá


ab lo títol de “Solucions catalanas” haurem de aplicar tot lo que
deixem explicat y alegat á la organisació que desitjem pera la nostra
terra.

La tasca no será difícil y podrem ferla en pocas páginas. Los dos


capítols més interesants pera’ls nostres compatricis serán
segurament dels més curts del llibre. Es natural que aixis resultin,
puig la aplicació dels sistemas que havem examinat, de segur que
s’ha anat presentant á la vista del lector á mida que anava seguint la
exposició dels meteixos.

Si algún dia arriba Espanya á entrar en la via del particularisme, pera


organisarse de conformitat ab los principis que habem exposat,
deurá atendre avans que tot á las institucions fonamentals que en
aquell moment condensin sa vida pública. Si segueix la monarquia, la
solució haurá de ser acomodada á aquesta forma de gobern, de la
meteixa manera que deuria enmotllarse á la republicana, si’l
particularisme vingués ab la república ó dintre de la república. En lo
primer cas, lo rey estaria al davant dels poders generals, tant si fossin
aquestos los propis de una Confederació ó Lliga com si fossin los que
requereix l’Estat compost per sa propia naturalesa. En lo segón, lo
poder general executiu fora exercit per un president, Consell ó
comissió de gobern.

Comensem per l’exámen de las solucions monárquicas que foran


aplicables al conjunt de la nació espanyola, y lo primer que farem,
será desembrassar lo nostre camí descartant algunas solucions
inaplicables á las circunstancias actuals de Espanya.

La monarquia en aquesta nació está sóls representada per una


dinastía que regna sobre tot lo territori y sobre tots sos habitants.
Cap regió particular de las que en altras épocas van disfrutar de la
independencia, té avuy dinastía propia. Fa ja sigles han desaparegut
las que regnaren en Aragó, en Navarra, etc., etc.. Y com las dinastias
no s’improvisan, ni’ls temps actuals están pera fer monarcas per
elecció, es evident que’l particularisme en Espanya no podrá jamay
pendre l’aspecte semi-feudal del imperi alemany, ni ser una
Confederació de distints regnes, principats ó senyoríos ab monarca ó
jefe propi en cada un d’ells. Totas las solucions que en tal aspecte’s
basan, són completament inaplicables á las condicions históricas
actuals de la nació espanyola.
Lo particularisme, donchs, hauria d’escullir entre’ls demés aspectes
que pot presentar la organisació federativa monárquica. Podria
constituhirse una Unió que tingués per llas la corona, ó bé establirse
una veritable Confederació, quins Estats particulars fossin
interiorment gobernats per molts, y quin poder general estigués
representat en sa branca executiva per lo monarca. Aquesta
Confederació podria ser més ó menys estreta, arrivant, si’s volgués á
tenir las condicions que caracterisan al Estat compost ó federatiu. Si’l
poder general llegislatiu, Diéta ó Cámara, únich ó multiple, y’l
monarca com jefe del poder executiu, no poguessin dirigirse més que
als poders particulars dels Estats, sens manar directament á llurs
habitants, la organisació fora una Confederació d’Estats: si llurs
disposicions poguessin obligar directament als habitants de tots los
Estats, tenint lo poder general órgans y medis propis pera fer efectius
sos acorts, lo sistema constituhiria un veritable Estat compost ó
federatiu.

Las condicions históricas del nostre pays indican la Unió que tingués
per llas la corona, com la solució preferible entre totas las
monárquicas. Los antecedents de las nostras Corts són que aquestas
siguin particulars pera cada una de las grans regions ó antichs Estats.
Pera formar lo cos llegislatiu general, podrian las Corts especials
nombrar delegacions que formessin una Diéta al costat del monarca,
deliberant reunidas sobre tots los assumptos que s’haguessin
declarat d’interés comú. La Diéta, per exemple, revisaria la política
exterior que iniciés lo monarca, y deliberaria sobre’ls tractats,
aliansas y relacions en general ab las potencias extrangeras; fixaria
las bases constitutivas de la forsa pública general; votaria los gastos
nacionals, repartint lo contingent entre’ls diversos Estats; iniciaria
las obras públicas d’interés comú á tota la nació; regularia lo comers
interior y exterior y tots los elements que l’auxilian, y dirigiria los
serveys generals, com correus, telégrafos, teléfonos interregionals
etc., etc.. La Diéta junt ab lo monarca foran los suprems guardadors
del ordre mediant la ferma garantia de las llibertats individuals y
corporativas, en tant que tribunals generals se cuidarian d’aplicar las
lleys comunas y de resoldre las diferencias que afectessin á més d’un
Estat y las qüestions en que un d’aquestos fos part interessada.

Cada Estat particular tindria las sevas Corts que exercirian lo poder
llegislatiu en totas aquellas materias de que no s’haguessin després
en pró del Conjunt, y aqueixas Corts podrian basarse en lo sistema
purament representatiu. Ellas cuidarian de tot lo referent á dret
privat, y dirigirian la política interior del Estat y la administració de
sos interessos, dintre de las lleys fonamentals del meteix, puig que es
inútil afegir, que cada un d’aquestos hauria de tenir la seva
Constitució propia, feta de nou, ó recopilada de las lleys y costums
antiguas, acomodadas á las necessitats é interessos d’avuy.

Lo poder executiu pera cada Estat podria estar organisat de duas


maneras. La autoritat ó Consell que estés al davant de cada un,
podrian ser nombrats ó be pel meteix Estat ó be per la Corona. En lo
primer cas, lo nombrament podrian ferlo las Corts, ó podria
encarregarse á la elecció popular, directa ó indirecta, de primer ó de
segón ó ters grau.

Los antecedents histórichs d’Espanya recomanan poch la primera


manera de organisació. La autoritat regional ó executiva dels Estats
particulars recordaria’ls Vireys, per molt que se li dongués un altre
títol, y’ls Vireys no han deixat massa bons recorts, tal vegada per
culpa més de la época en que van existir, que de llur propias culpas.
Si’ls poders executius dels Estats haguessin de ser nombrats per la
Corona y ser llochtinents d’aquesta, creyem que lo més encertat fora
no encarregarlos á una persona, sino á un Consell. Los Consells son
simpátichs á Espanya, encara que moltas vegadas no hagin dat bons
resultats, sinó al contrari. Aixís meteix creyem que un Consell fora la
millor forma dels poders executius particulars dels Estats en lo cas
de que las Corts ó’l poble d’aquestos deguessin nombrarlos.

Molts punts essencials de organisació haurian de ser resolts de la


meteixa manera si la solució fós monárquica que si fós republicana.
La divisió de Espanya en Estats ó grans regions deuria ser igual en la
república que en la monarquía. Los antecedents histórichs, las
condicions en que viuhen, los sentiments, los interessos morals y
materials y tots los demés datos que serveixen pera determinar las
personalitats políticas, nos diuhen eloqüentment que aquestas son
en Espanya las grans regions que havian gosat de vida independent
en altras épocas. La divisió actual en provincias es purament una
arbitrarietat del unitarisme, perpetrada precisament pera destruhir
aquellas personalitats, que li feyan nosa.

Las grans regions, donchs, deurian ser las pedras angulars del edifici
del particularisme. En ellas podria carregarse tota la obra que’s
construhís. Llur personalitat s’aguanta ferma y robusta entre mitj de
las runas que per tot arreu ha fet l’unitarisme. Las grans regions que
formaren la antigua Confederació aragonesa se conservan en tan bon
estat, que ni tant sóls fora necessari procedir á fitarlas de nou. Las de
la corona castellana, veritat es que no están tan desllindadas ni gosan
de tanta salut y robustés; pero, aixis y tot, conservan los aparells y
conductes necessaris pera que per ells pugui tornar á circularhi la
sanch, al recobrar la vida que avuy los manca.

Mes, en lo cas de que lo temperament dels habitants de las regions


castellanas las portés á no accedir á las solucions particularistas; si
no volguessin rompre la uniformitat á la que están ja acostumadas en
tots los terrenos, y creguessin que un sol poder, un sol códich, una
sola administració, y una sola política han de fer llur felicitat, no per
aixó fora impossible lo particularisme, dins de la monarquía ni dins
de la república. Llavoras, en lloch de basar la organisació en la
Confederació de Estats ó en l’Estat compost, la basariam en lo
dualisme, com á l’imperi austro-húngar. Dels dos membres, lo
format per la part castellana de la Península se mantindria unificat y
tan concentrat com volgués, en tant que’l format per la part
aragonesa se organisaria baix la base particularista, y reconeixería
las personalitats de las grans regions ben marcadas que’l componen.

Tot lo que acabem d’exposar es aplicable lo meteix á la monarquía


que á la república, y á la una y á l’altra forma de gobern ho fora
també lo régimen concordatari, que tan bons resultats ha donat á la
Confederació suissa. Lo régimen concordatari respón perfectament á
la organisació particularista. Quan distints Estats ó regions están
units per llassos generals suaus y poch estrets, alguns senten la
necessitat ó la conveniencia d’estrenyer y enfortir aquells llassos, en
tant que’ls restants no las senten. En tals casos se resol la qüestió per
medi de Concordats. Los Estats ó regions que ho desitjan, los
estableixen entre ells per acte d’expontánea voluntat, y’ls demés
quedan tan lliures com eran. Los Concordats particulars poden ser
posats baix la garantía dels poders federals, que s’encarregan de fer
cumplir totas llurs clausulas pels concordataris durant lo temps pel
que s’han obligat. Lo régimen concordatari pot aplicarse á materias
jurídicas, administrativas, comercials, etc., etc.. Per son medi los
Estats més afins desempenyan en comú alguns serveys, en benefici
de tots ells. Si’s realisés la Confederació espanyola, monárquica ó
republicana, los Estats de la antigua agregació aragonesa-catalana
podrian treure gran profit del régimen concordatari.

Passem ja á examinar las solucions republicanas aplicables al


conjunt de la nació espanyola.

Al exposar los fonaments científichs del particularisme, hem vist que


la organisació que millor los representa es lo Estat compost ó
federatiu. Si aquest fós possible, aquest voldriam.

Mes, donada la situació de decahiment y degeneració en que’s troban


las regions totas de la Península, si s’entrés de sopte en tal
organisació, tal vegada los resultats foran contraproduhents. L’Estat
compost ó federatiu requereix que’l poder llegislatiu general sigui
exercit per una gran Assamblea, formada per duas Cámaras, y es de
temer que’ls polítichs á la madrilenya logressin falsificarla desde sa
naixensa. En ella hi trovarian sens dupte lo medi de seguir dominant
y de desacreditar lo nou régimen. Es propi, ademés, de un Estat
compost un poder executiu, president ó Consell, fort y armat de
grans atribucions, que fora una altra porta falsa per la qual aquells
lograrian tal vegada introduhirse en la nova organisació.

Per tots aquestos motius y molts altres de semblants, si á Espanya


hagués de constituhirse una Confederació republicana, lo millor fora
que de prompte lo poder general quedés reduhit á una Diéta de
delegacions dels Estats particulars, la qual designés las autoritats
executivas y establís las judicials. Baix sa direcció fariam
l’aprenentaje, y un cop estéssim en disposició de ser fadrins, que tal
vegada no tardariam massa, podriam fácilment millorar la
organisació, convertintla en la propia del Estat compost ó federatiu.
Las reglas á que aquest está subjecte las hem ja exposadas en altres
capítols, y no hem de reproduhirlas. A tals reglas deuria acomodarse
la organisació espanyola, en quant fossin compatibles ab las
condicions, necessitats y modo de ser de la nació en lo moment en
que hagués de aplicarlas.

Per lo dit s’haurá pogut veure, que las solucions particularistas


aplicables á Espanya en general, són eminentment variadas, aixis
baix la forma republicana com baix la forma monárquica. Totas ellas,
empero, coincideixen en un punt culminant: totas arrencan del
principi de reconeixer las personalitats de las distintas regions en
que la historia, la geografía y’l carácter dels habitants han dividit la
Península.

L’esperit regional es l’únich element de regeneració que nos queda.


Res hi fa que estigui esmortuhit, puig que bastaria una conmoció
forta pera deixondarlo. Mirem lo que passa en la vida real. Fins
aquells que més degenerats están, tenen latent l’amor á la regió, y á
son crit responen quasi sempre. Lo més embrutit dels catalans
estima á Catalunya y faria algun sacrifici pera véurela dignificada per
la llibertat. Iguals sentiments experimentan los fills de la major part
de las regions espanyolas.
L’afecte de patria, com havem dit en altres párrafos, es tan més
intens, com més reduhit sigui’l cércol á que s’extengui. L’amor á la
patria gran es tan débil, que hi ha molts altres sentiments que’l
sobrepujan. Lo republicá catalá, per exemple, se sent molt més lligat
ab lo republicá francés ó rús que ab lo monárquich de Andalucía y
vice-versa. Lo llegitimista francés, rebria á mans besadas l’auxili del
enemich més implacable de Fransa, si aquest enemich, alemany, rús
ó inglés anés á tirar per terra la república. Sols quan la patria directa
es petita, l’afecte que inspira pot sobreposarse als sentiments
contraris que’l debilitan.

Totas las solucions que havem exposat fortificarian l’esperit regional;


totas reduhirian la patria inmediata, y vigorisarian lo patriotisme.
Qualsevol d’ellas, donchs, seria lo primer pas cap á la regeneració.
Establert lo particularisme, encara que fos per medi de una
organisació imperfecta, prou nos cuidariam després de
perfeccionarlo, cada hú de conformitat ab sas aficions especials. La
forsa expansiva del sistema faria que las més convenients á la
situació del pays fossin las que triunfessin en definitiva.
Capitol VI.

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