Spanish Ultraism’s Sacred Woman of the Future
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Zachary Rockwell Ludington
Abstract
This essay interprets the ‘woman of the future’ in Spanish Ultraism as a hierophany, a sacred manifestation of the movement’s faith in a Futurist utopia. From Ramón Gómez de la Serna’s translation of Marinetti’s Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism (1909) to the movement’s poetry after the First World War, the ultraístas continually experimented with Marinettian iconoclasm, often attacking religious and artistic tradition even as they reproduced the syntax, gestures and indeed reverence of religious ritual and iconography. I demonstrate through an analysis of Ultraism’s shifting representations of women, which invested sacred import in images of technological goddesses, Marian saviours and sensual muses, that avant-garde iconoclasm is animated by a fundamental paradox: the assault on traditional images of reverence in art and religion depends on the constant repetition and reproduction of those very images. Thus, the Ultraists’ “Futurist woman a la española”, in Suárez Trejo’s felicitous formulation, operated as a hierophany, Mircea Eliade’s term for a sacred object that provides order and direction to human endeavours. I demonstrate how the Ultraist reconceptualization of femininity, indebted to Marinetti’s paradoxical iconoclasm, allowed avantgardists in Spain to orient their irreverent dreams for a novel artistic and political future.
Abstract
This essay interprets the ‘woman of the future’ in Spanish Ultraism as a hierophany, a sacred manifestation of the movement’s faith in a Futurist utopia. From Ramón Gómez de la Serna’s translation of Marinetti’s Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism (1909) to the movement’s poetry after the First World War, the ultraístas continually experimented with Marinettian iconoclasm, often attacking religious and artistic tradition even as they reproduced the syntax, gestures and indeed reverence of religious ritual and iconography. I demonstrate through an analysis of Ultraism’s shifting representations of women, which invested sacred import in images of technological goddesses, Marian saviours and sensual muses, that avant-garde iconoclasm is animated by a fundamental paradox: the assault on traditional images of reverence in art and religion depends on the constant repetition and reproduction of those very images. Thus, the Ultraists’ “Futurist woman a la española”, in Suárez Trejo’s felicitous formulation, operated as a hierophany, Mircea Eliade’s term for a sacred object that provides order and direction to human endeavours. I demonstrate how the Ultraist reconceptualization of femininity, indebted to Marinetti’s paradoxical iconoclasm, allowed avantgardists in Spain to orient their irreverent dreams for a novel artistic and political future.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Table of Contents V
- Editorial IX
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Section 1: Futurism Studies
- Futurism and Theosophy: Giacomo Balla and His Circle 1
- Making the Tables Dance: Seances, Ghosts and Futurism 37
- Stati d’animo: Futurism, Theosophy and Portraiture 57
- Desecrating the Divine, Sacralizing Humanity: Futurist Religion vs. Romantic Mysticism 83
- Futurist Dissonance, Theosophical Transcendence and American Musical Ultra-Modernism, 1909–1930 107
- Esotericism and the Occult in F. T. Marinetti: Aspects of the Sacred in Futurist Gnosis 131
- Religious Traces within Polish Futurism: Entangled Ways of the Sacred 161
- Spanish Ultraism’s Sacred Woman of the Future 201
- Tullio d’Albisola’s L’anguria lirica (1934): Female Transubstantiation and a New Religion of Poetic Materiality 225
- Renewing the Sacred and the Sublime: From Early Futurist Manifestos to Marinetti’s Aeropoem of Jesus 259
- From Futurism to Spiritual Classicism: Gino Severini and the Neo-Catholic Avant-garde 281
- Leandra Angelucci Cominazzini: Revisiting the Futurist Debate on Speed, the Sacred and the Spiritual 299
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Section 2: Reviews
- Futurist Manifestos Revisited 327
- Santa Rita Pintor: Work and Life of a Portuguese Futurist Painter 333
- A New Study on Futurism in Sicily 341
- Notes on Two Novels in a Post-Neo-Futurist Key 345
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Section 3: Bibliography
- A Bibliography of Publications on Futurism, 2018–2021 357
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Section 4: Back Matter
- List of Illustrations and Provenance Descriptions 375
- Notes on Contributors 379
- Name Index 387
- Subject Index 411
- Geographical Index 437
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Table of Contents V
- Editorial IX
-
Section 1: Futurism Studies
- Futurism and Theosophy: Giacomo Balla and His Circle 1
- Making the Tables Dance: Seances, Ghosts and Futurism 37
- Stati d’animo: Futurism, Theosophy and Portraiture 57
- Desecrating the Divine, Sacralizing Humanity: Futurist Religion vs. Romantic Mysticism 83
- Futurist Dissonance, Theosophical Transcendence and American Musical Ultra-Modernism, 1909–1930 107
- Esotericism and the Occult in F. T. Marinetti: Aspects of the Sacred in Futurist Gnosis 131
- Religious Traces within Polish Futurism: Entangled Ways of the Sacred 161
- Spanish Ultraism’s Sacred Woman of the Future 201
- Tullio d’Albisola’s L’anguria lirica (1934): Female Transubstantiation and a New Religion of Poetic Materiality 225
- Renewing the Sacred and the Sublime: From Early Futurist Manifestos to Marinetti’s Aeropoem of Jesus 259
- From Futurism to Spiritual Classicism: Gino Severini and the Neo-Catholic Avant-garde 281
- Leandra Angelucci Cominazzini: Revisiting the Futurist Debate on Speed, the Sacred and the Spiritual 299
-
Section 2: Reviews
- Futurist Manifestos Revisited 327
- Santa Rita Pintor: Work and Life of a Portuguese Futurist Painter 333
- A New Study on Futurism in Sicily 341
- Notes on Two Novels in a Post-Neo-Futurist Key 345
-
Section 3: Bibliography
- A Bibliography of Publications on Futurism, 2018–2021 357
-
Section 4: Back Matter
- List of Illustrations and Provenance Descriptions 375
- Notes on Contributors 379
- Name Index 387
- Subject Index 411
- Geographical Index 437
