Giacomo Balla: Designing the Future

Giacomo Balla (1871–1958) is one of the undisputed masters of modernist Italian art. From his position as a key exponent of Divisionism, Balla went on to become, in 1910, one of the five signatories of the Technical Manifesto of Futurist Painting, Futurism’s first attempt to explicate its artistic vision. Balla was a pioneering figure of European modernism, one of the first artists to aim at the transformation of everyday life in accordance with avant-garde aesthetics.

Giacomo Balla: Designing the Future brings together important and rarely seen pieces from the Fondazione Biagiotti Cigna—one of the largest collections of Balla’s works anywhere in the world—curated by Fabio Benzi, a leading authority on the artist. This volume spans Balla’s entire career, including both figurative and abstract paintings and drawings, as well as examples of his fashion and applied art designs.