Wassily Kandinsky
1866-1944
Kandinsky, himself an accomplished musician,
once said Color is the keyboard, the eyes are
the harmonies, the soul is the piano with many
strings.
The artist is the hand that plays, touching
one key or another, to cause vibrations in
the soul.
The concept that color and musical
harmony are linked has a long history,
intriguing scientists such as Sir Isaac
Newton.
Kandinsky used color in a highly
theoretical way associating tone with
timbre (the sound's character), hue
with pitch, and saturation with the
volume of sound. He even claimed
that when he saw color he heard
music
Autumn in Bavaria
1908; Oil on cardboard, 33x45cm; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
Improvisation 7
1910 (180 Kb); Oil on canvas, 131 x 97 cm; Tretyakov Gallery,
Composition IV
1911 (170 Kb); Oil on canvas, 159.5 x 250.5 cm (62 7/8 x 98 5/8 in); Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfallen,
Dusseldorf
Composition V
1911 (170 Kb); Oil on canvas, 190 x 275 cm (6' 3 7/8" x 9' 1/4"); Private collection
Improvisation 31 (Sea Battle)
Improvisation 31 has a less generalized title, Sea Battle, and by taking this hint we can indeed see how he has used
the image of two tall ships shooting cannonballs at each other, and abstracted these specifics down into the glorious
commotion of the picture. Though it does not show a sea battle, it makes us experience one, with its confusion,
courage, excitement, and furious motion
Black Spot I
1912 (200 Kb); Oil on canvas, 100 x 130 cm; The Hermitage, St. Petersburg
Ravine Improvisation
1914 (110 Kb); Oil on cardboard, 110 x 110 cm; Stadtische, Munich
Composition VI
1913 (170 Kb); Oil on canvas, 195 x 300 cm (6' 4 3/4" x 10'); Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg
Composition VII
1913 (200 Kb); Oil on canvas, 200 x 300 cm (6' 6 3/4" x 9' 11 1/8"); Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
Small Pleasures
Fragment 2 for Composition VII
1913 (180 Kb); Oil on canvas, 87.5 x 99.5 cm (34 1/2 x 39 1/4 in); Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY
On White II
1923; Oil on canvas, 105 x 98cm; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
Composition VIII
1923 (140 Kb); Oil on canvas, 140 x 201 cm (55 1/8 x 79 1/8 in); Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Black and Violet
1923
Contrasting
Sounds
1924; Oil on
cardboard,
70x49.5cm;
Centre
Georges
Pompidou,
Paris
Yellow, Red, Blue
1925; Oil on canvas, 127x200cm; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris
Composition IX
1936 (120 Kb); Oil on canvas, 113.5 x 195 cm (44 5/8 x 76 3/4 in); Musee National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges
Pompidou, Paris
Biography
Born in Moscow in 1866, Kandinsky spent his early
childhood in Odessa. His parents played the piano and the
zither and Kandinsky himself learned the piano and cello at
an early age. The influence of music in his paintings cannot
be overstated, down to the names of his paintings
Improvisations, Impressions, and Compositions. In 1886,
he enrolled at the University of Moscow, chose to study law
and economics, and after passing his examinations, lectured
at the Moscow Faculty of Law.
Soon thereafter, at the age of thirty, Kandinsky
left Moscow and went to Munich to study lifedrawing, sketching and anatomy, regarded then
as basic for an artistic education.
Ironically, Kandinsky's work moved in a direction
that was of much greater abstraction than that
which was pioneered by the Impressionists. It was
not long before his talent surpassed the
constraints of art school and he began exploring
his own ideas of painting - "I applied streaks and
blobs of colors onto the canvas with a palette
knife and I made them sing with all the intensity I
could..." Now considered to be the founder of
abstract art, his work was exhibited throughout
Europe from 1903 onwards, and often caused
controversy among the public, the art critics, and
his contemporaries
In 1933, Kandinsky left Germany and settled near Paris, in
Neuilly. The paintings from these later years were again the
subject of controversy. Though out of favor with many of
the patriarchs of Paris's artistic community, younger artists
admired Kandinsky. His studio was visited regularly by
Miro, Arp, Magnelli and Sophie Tauber.
Kandinsky continued painting almost until his death in
June, 1944. his unrelenting quest for new forms which
carried him to the very extremes of geometric abstraction
have provided us with an unparalleled collection of abstract
art.
Composition X
1939 (160 Kb); Oil on canvas, 130 x 195 cm (51 1/8 x 76 3/4 in); Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Dusseldo
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Kandinsky’s work?