Introduction
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Introduction |
| Late in 1913 England, Wyndham Lewis, Ezra Pound, and "several young artists began to prepare a review of the modern movement in the arts" (Cassidy 24). Blast, a short-lived periodical of just two issues, announced "the birth of Vorticism, a London based art movement that opposed Futurism" (Cassidy 24). These to be Vorticists at first welcomed Marinetti and his Futurism as he toured London in the dawning years of the Great War, "but they soon became actively hostile towards the Italian movement (Wees 347). The pre-Vorticists were supportive of many ideas of Futurism, until Marinetti made the mistake of trying to assimilate them, by stating that "the Lewis group was Futurist" (Cassidy 24). Marinetti’s statement hurt the pride of the British artists, so in retaliation they published their first issue of Blast. The purpose of Blast was to wake "London up and to introduce the modern habit of mind into a city whose artists and art public lagged a full generation behind the rest of Europe" (Cassidy 30). However, Blast never had a chance to be received by the British public, as two weeks after the periodical was published war broke out, and "England lost interest in art" (Cassidy 30). Vorticism was short lived and had few members, "as the group never amounted to mote than four or five painters, one sculptor, and two poets" (Tuma 412). |