rushing, futurism

Natalia Goncharova, Courtesy of Wikipedia and Russian Federation

natalia goncharova
the cyclist
1913
oil on canvas, 78×105 cm
the russian museum, st. petersburg

Date: April 19, 02009
Feedback: 2 comments | Permalink: url
Tags: architecture+space | art | body athletic | cycling | temporality

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2 responses to rushing, futurism

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  1. Ted says:
    April 20th, 2009

    It's interesting that the rider appears to have his eyes closed as his body becomes a blur…not "around" him but in a way without him? Do you know what the T02 stands for if anything?

    Is this contemporary existence? Face down, driving forward oblivious to the hand clearly pointing back to the more sustainable position we started from?

  2. sportsbabel says:
    April 23rd, 2009

    I don't know about the alphanumerics in this case, Ted, but I am reminded of the scene in "World Record" from the Animatrix in which Dan Davis reaches such a speed (and pain threshold) that he emerges from the Matrix and numbers start flying at him.

    And on the topic of text, what stood out for me was that the man is biking a path from right-to-left on the canvas, which stands so counter to our normal Western way of "reading" things left-to-right. Even the Cyrillic alphabet runs left-to-right, I think, and so in concert with the hand pointing back the other direction, it certainly seems as if speed is trying to overcome some great inertia.

    Virilio, on the other hand, would suggest that speed creates its own inertia: a polar inertia.

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