ABSTRACT
This essay examines three paintings of sporting cyclists completed within 18 months of one another: the German Expressionist Lyonel Feininger’s The Bicycle Race; the French Cubist Jean Metzinger’s At the Cycle-Race Track; and the Italian Futurist Umberto Boccioni’s Dynamism of a Cyclist. Although near-contemporaneous, the works are notable for their spread across Europe. Professional cycling developed as a distinct facet of modernity. Races were supported by the emerging sporting press in tandem with cycle manufacturers; they were a form of exhibition as much as a contest. But although the subject matter is identical, the paintings are not reducible to one another. Feininger focuses on the uniformity of a group of cyclists. Metzinger’s work is linked to French nationalism. Boccioni painted as a response to rival efforts to depict movement as well as the adoption of sporting themes by Salon Cubism, which threatened Italian Futurism’s identity as a separate movement.
