In 1917, Filippo Tommaso Martinetti promulgated the Manifesto of Futurist Dance, a text that, in addition to gathering thoughtful comments from the author on key figures in early 20th-century choreography such as Isadora Duncan and Vaslav Nijinsky, emphasized the need to imitate through the art of gesture the movements of machines in order to merge with the ideal "multiplied body" of the engine. "Dissonant, rude, ungraceful, asymmetrical, synthetic, dynamic, word-free": these were the characteristics of Futurist dance, a dance that was intended to have no other purpose than to "magnify heroism, dominator of metals and fused with the divine machines of speed and war." The Manifesto concludes with the description of three dances inspired by as many war mechanisms: shrapnel, machine gun, and airplane.
It was in the late 1970s that Silvana Barbarini, the founding choreographer of the Italian company Vera Stasi, became interested in Futurism, influenced by her training in Voghera at the school of Martinetti's muse, dancer Giannina Censi. Siio Vlummia-Torrente n.3, a performance dedicated to Censi, derives its title from a word-free poem by Fortunato Depero. The piece consists of about thirty scenes based on poems by Giacomo Balla, music by Russolo, programmatic statements drawn from the manifestos, and onomatopoeic dances inspired by airplane flight, war, and modern life in line with the Futurist theory of the machine-body. Among the most evocative pieces is the solo Decollaggio, an aerodance set to Martinetti's voice, created by Barbarini together with Censi in 1979, also presented in the afternoon at the Depero Museum during the exhibition Danzare il Futurismo.
