Factory Foltzer 1909

Umberto Boccioni's 'Factory Foltzer’ seems like it was built up with dry brushstrokes and a gritty palette of earthy browns, reds, and creams, like he was digging right into the dirt with his brush! I can imagine Boccioni, out in the fields, trying to capture this factory. Look at the repeated vertical windows which create a very strong line, against the brown mountain in the background. He's using a kind of Pointillist technique, but it's rougher, more urgent, and less blended somehow. You can almost feel him trying to find a way to represent the energy of the modern world. He’s using a fairly limited range of colors, which is a constraint, but it allows him to think more about tone and touch. It reminds me a bit of some of Monet’s industrial scenes, but with a rougher, more modern edge. These artists were not just depicting what they saw, but also trying to grapple with the profound changes happening in their world. It’s like they're searching, brushstroke by brushstroke, for a way to make sense of it all, and that, for me, is what makes painting so endlessly compelling.