This paper investigates the influence of chronophotography on twentieth-century modern art. Etienne-Jules Marey, nineteenth-century French physiologist, invented chronophotography to analyze the locomotion of animals. Although Marey’s experiments with photography were resulted from his scientific intention to investigate movements, his chronophotography has a substantial impact on twentieth-century art. First of all, French academic artists had corrected the leg positions of galloping horses by referring to photographic records provided by Marey and Eadweard Muybridge. However, scientific instantaneous photography was not well received by the art world. It had to counter fierce criticism from the artists, Auguste Rodin in particular, and writers who believed in artistic conventions. Since Marey’s death, a number of artists have reevaluated the significance of his photography and adopted it in expressing their individual visions of modernity. František Kupka in Puteaux Group was one of the first avant-garde artists who were deeply influenced by Marey’s photography. Marcel Duchamp referred to Marey’s chronophotography, which introduced him to the idea of mechanization as an alternative to a sensible beauty. Italian Futurists also used Marey’s photography as their visual reference to express the dynamic sensation of the passage of time. Giacomo Balla was familiar with Marey’s photography and directly influenced by his chronophotography. While taking Marey’s image as a model, Anton Bragaglia tried to overcome the limit of his instantaneous photography by stressing the continuous trajectory of movement, with which to address photodynamism. Despite its strong impact, Marey’s photography encountered stiff resistance from the art world, which valued the conventions in art over the novelty in technology. It should be noted that Umberto Boccioni criticized Bragaglia’s active use of photography because Boccioni did not accept photography as art medium. The apparent conflicts and ambivalence in accepting Marey’s photography by the Futurists, who promoted the idea of dynamism, show the complex relationship between art and science, art and photography.