Umberto Boccioni (19 October 1882 - 16 August 1916) Italian futurist painter and sculptor.
Selfportrait
He was born in Reggio Calabria and became later one of the key figures of the Italian Futurism. After several arguments with his family, he decided to leave home to become an artist. He had already taken some drawing classes with one of the local artists. He met Gino Severini and a little later the two became students of Giacomo Balla.
Boccioni travelled for the next few years, before settling in Milan, in 1908, at that time the cultural centre of Italy.
Already an enthusiastic of the Futurist ideas, he met Marinetti in 1910 and a month later he became one of the artists who signed the now famous Manifesto of Futurist Painters. By 1912 he started to produce mainly sculptures, and issued his Futurist Manifesto of Sculpture. Influenced by Cubism, he prefered to use in his works a Futurist approach, sensing that this was better to express the dynamism of human and animal form. One of the theorists of the mouvement, he published in 1914 the bokk "Futurist Painting and Sculpture", very well received by his fellow artists.
Interested in politics, in 1914 he demonstrated in favor of Italy's entry into the war, although he only painted one work on the theme of war. At the beginning of the hostilities Boccioni enrolled as a volunteer.