Curated by Daniela Fonti and Filippo Bacci di Capaci
PALP Palazzo Pretorio Pontedera
Museo Piaggio
December 9, 2016 | April 18, 2017
With the grand exhibition Tutti in moto! The Myth of Speed in One Hundred Years of Art, curated by Daniela Fonti and Filippo Bacci di Capaci, on December 9, 2016, the Palazzo Pretorio of Pontedera will open to the public under the new name PALP, after extensive restoration work that has transformed it into the city’s new exhibition space.
Promoted by the Fondazione per la Cultura Pontedera, the Municipality of Pontedera, and the Fondazione Piaggio, under the patronage of the Tuscany Region, the exhibition is entirely dedicated to the myth of speed and its reflection in figurative arts, lifestyle ideals, and Italian social customs from the late 19th century to the economic boom years.
The theme of speed, often associated with the idea of travel and the expansion of railway transport, emerged in Italian art at the end of the 19th century and would deeply characterize it in certain periods, due to the rapid evolution of discoveries and industrial applications in locomotion.
The Tutti in moto! Exhibition
The Tutti in moto! exhibition has its main venue at Palazzo Pretorio in Pontedera, with a dedicated section at the Museo Piaggio for larger works. The Museo Piaggio also hosts the photographic exhibition Futurism, Speed, and Photography, curated by Giovanni Lista, which documents the Futurists’ approach to speed as a modern myth.
Both exhibitions will continue until April 18, 2017.
The Exhibition at Palazzo Pretorio
The Tutti in moto! exhibition at Palazzo Pretorio begins with a portrayal of Italy’s past—its traditions, its origins, and its transformation from a largely rural country where people traveled on foot, horseback, or by sail, into one shaped by the arrival of machines and speed. This transformation is narrated through the exhibition rooms, each dedicated to a different means of locomotion: the train, tram, steamboat, bicycle, automobile, omnibus, motorcycle, and finally the balloon, airship, and powered airplane.
More than 250 works—including paintings, sculptures, photographs, and posters—by major Italian artists such as Fattori, Bianchi, Viani, Ziveri, Severini, Baldessari, Carrà, Boccioni, Balla, and Depero illustrate the impact of evolving mechanical transport on collective imagination. The exhibition concludes with the sensational design of the Vespa, which celebrates its glorious 70th anniversary this year.
The first room narrates Italy’s past, a still rural country yet already on the path to rapid modernization. Paintings by Fattori, Ferrazzi, Moses Levy, and Viani, along with sculptures by Cambellotti and Marino Marini, depict an ancient mythic world still embedded in Italian landscapes.
The urban landscape then comes to life with the arrival of the tram, facilitating movement and city expansion while swallowing the countryside. The streets are drawn with the linear tracks (Carlo Levi, Primo Conti), later integrating road signs in Futurist works, while train stations emerge as new urban hubs, their grand glass halls filled with smoke (Boccioni, Moses Levy).
Meanwhile, trains have made long-distance travel easier for decades. Painted since the late 19th century as enormous yet benevolent smoking monsters, locomotives dominate Lumière’s screens as well as Futurist canvases (Boccioni, Carrà, Bonzagni). Alongside trains, ships have shrunk the world, enabling exchanges between continents. Artists depict shipyards (Viani) and the metaphysical silence surrounding massive ocean liners towering over docks (Ram, Thayaht).
Then comes the automobile—”more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace,” as proclaimed by Marinetti—fascinating as the ultimate symbol of modernity, adopted by the upper classes in sync with the explosion of Futurism (Cambellotti, Balla). It inspires many Futurist works (Balla), along with the motorcycle, prized for the fusion between rider and engine (Dottori, Sironi, Giannattasio, Pannaggi, Tato, BOT). After World War II, as mass motorization approaches, cars and motorcycles, with their aerodynamic forms, influence a new generation of abstract sculptors (Franchina).
Among mechanical speed demons, the bicycle stands out as a simple yet ingenious vehicle, present since the mid-19th century—first associated with bourgeois etiquette, then spreading to all social classes. Paintings by Gentilini and Viviani preserve its original charm, while its dynamic motion, highlighted by spinning spokes, captivates Futurists (Severini, Dottori, Boccioni, Cangiullo).
Futurism played a crucial role in celebrating dynamism and mechanical speed in art and literature. In 1929, inspired by transatlantic flights, a new artistic movement emerged: Aeropainting, celebrating flight from heroic perspectives to the ominous depictions of wartime air raids (Tato, Thayaht, Regina, Depero, Dottori, Crali, Sironi, Peruzzi, Nomellini, Marinetti, Munari). The fascination with speed extended to naval transport as well, with artists capturing the grandeur of ocean liners crossing seas, soon to carry thousands of emigrating Italians.
In post-war Italy, the tram, train, and bicycle symbolized a country striving for unity and dignity in reconstruction. Reconverted to peacetime industry, Italy gifted itself the Vespa—a newfound dream of joy and hope for the future.
The exhibition also includes 1930s-1960s film posters complementing the artworks, a curated selection of rare Futurist publications, and a documentary by ArtDocFestival, Tutti in moto!, featuring vintage film clips and archival photos illustrating how new means of transport transformed Italian life and landscapes.
The Exhibitions at Museo Piaggio
The Tutti in moto! exhibition continues in the spacious halls of Museo Piaggio, showcasing 21 large-format works that revisit themes explored at Palazzo Pretorio. This section is enriched by historical vehicles that have shaped the history of two-wheel speed.
The Museo Piaggio also hosts the original exhibition Futurism, Speed, and Photography, curated by Giovanni Lista, a distinguished scholar of historical avant-garde movements. Featuring over 100 photographs by renowned artists (including the Bragaglia brothers, Tato, Azari, Bellusi, Boccardi, and Bertoglio) from the world’s most famous collections, this exhibition explores Futurism’s artistic approach to dynamism, aerodynamics, and speed.
