Bruno Munari

Bruno Munari was born in Milan in 1907. During his youth, Munari was attracted by the theories of futurism, and he exhibited his works in some futurist shows. In 1923, he wrote with the artist Aligi Sassu a manifesto, Dinamismo e pittura muscolare (dynamism and muscular painting), that was based on the futurist principles of art as movement, celebration of machines and technological progress. Few years later Munari started working on the Macchine inutili (useless machines), first exhibited in 1933: mechanisms presented as experimental models investigating the possibilities of perception, making him a precursor of the optical art. Considered one of the greatest protagonists of art, design and graphics of the 20th Century, he maintained its whimsical creativity in support of the investigation of construction of form through tactile and visual experiments and his great ability to communicate with words, objects and toys. After the war, Munari slowly abandoned futurism and started to gravitate towards the Movimento Arte Concreta, a movement that was completely rethinking non-figurative art, highlighting the difference between abstract and concrete art. Among his most important works of this period are the Proiezioni di Luce (Light Projections); Libri Illeggibili (Illegible Books); Macchine Aritmiche (Arrhythmic Machines); Oggetti trovati (Found Objects), while still working on the Macchine inutili. In 1951, Negativo-positivo is on the cover of the French magazine Art d’Aujourd’Hui, that dedicated a monographical number to Italian abstract art. In 1954, he won Compasso d’oro, the most prestigious Italian prize dedicated to design and figurative arts, for the rubber animal models designed for Pirelli. His fame further increased, and he started to held solo and collective shows in some of the most importants museum institutions. In his later life, Munari was worried by the misperception of his artistic work, which is still confused with the other type of his activity (didactics, design, graphics), and decided to select art historian Miroslava Hajek as curator of a selection of his most important works in 1969. This collection, structured chronologically, shows his continuous creativity, thematic coherence and the evolution of his artistic thought and philosophy throughout his entire life. Munari died in Milan in 1998.