There are probably no people who, upon first acquaintance with Kandinsky’s work, would recognize his genius. The first glance at his “compositions”, “improvisations” and “impressions” provokes different thoughts: from “a child could paint this” to “what did the artist want to depict in this picture?” And upon deeper acquaintance, it turns out that the artist did not intend to depict anything, he wanted to make you feel.
The great discoverer of abstraction, Wassily Kandinsky, had absolutely no intention of becoming an artist, much less a philosopher of the art world. On the contrary, his father, the famous Moscow businessman of that time Vasily Silvestorovich Kandinsky, saw him as a successful lawyer, which led the future abstract artist to the law faculty of Moscow University, where he studied political economics and statistics. Of course, Kandinsky grew up in an intelligent family that did not deny the importance of art in a person’s life, so as a young man Vasily received basic knowledge in the world of music and painting. But he returned to them only after he turned 30, which once again confirmed the simple truth - it’s never too late to start. Despite his love for his homeland, in particular for Moscow, which will appear on his canvases more than once, Kandinsky in 1896, for the sake of his passion for painting, moved to Munich - a city famous at that time for its openness to new genres of art and hospitality for aspiring artists . The impetus for leaving the usual way of life and going into the unknown was a reason completely unrelated to art - a very big thing happened in the world of physics. an important event- discovery of the decomposition of the atom. As Kandinsky himself wrote in his letters to his scientific supervisor, this revolution in the world of physics gave him strange feelings: “Thick vaults collapsed. Everything became unfaithful, shaky and soft...".
The fact that the smallest particle is not integral, but consists of many still unexplored elements, led the future artist to a new worldview. Kandinsky realized that everything in this world can be broken down into separate components, and he himself described this feeling as follows:
“It (the discovery) resonated within me like the sudden destruction of the entire world.”.
Another reason for a complete revolution in Kandinsky’s consciousness was the exhibition French impressionists, brought to Moscow. On it he saw Claude Monet’s painting “Haystack”. This work struck Vasily Vasilyevich with its pointlessness, since before that he was familiar exclusively with realistic painting Russian artists. Despite the fact that the plot is difficult to guess in the picture, it touches certain feelings, inspires and remains in the memory. It was precisely such deep and moving works that Kandinsky decided to create.
In Germany, Wassily Kandinsky quickly mastered classical drawing, the techniques of the Impressionists, Post-Impressionists and Fauves, and soon became a recognized avant-garde artist. In 1901, his first professional painting, “Munich. Planegg 1", which combined Van Gogh's bright brushstrokes and gentle sunlight impressionists. Subsequently, Kandinsky in his work began to move away from the detailing of his creations, moving from realism to experiments with color.
"Munich. Planegg 1" (1901) – Private Collection
The first step on the path to abstraction was the writing of the philosophical treatise “On the Spiritual in Art” in 1910. The book was far ahead of its time, so it was very difficult to find a publisher for it. An interesting fact is that the original was written by Kandinsky in German, and the book was published in Russian only in 1967 in New York thanks to the International Literary Commonwealth and the artist’s wife, Nina Kandinskaya. In the original language in Munich, the book was published in 1911 and had incredible success. During the year it was published 3 times, and in Scandinavia, Switzerland and Holland, where it is distributed German, the book was read by everyone who had at least some connection to art. Russian avant-garde artists had the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the contents of the treatise at the All-Russian Congress of Artists in December 1911 thanks to the report of N.I. Kulbin "On the spiritual in art." In it, he used some chapters of Kandinsky's book, including a chapter on the different possible geometric forms in abstract art, which greatly influenced the leading Russian artists of the time, including Kazimir Malevich. But Kandinsky’s work is not a textbook. “On the Spiritual in Art” is a philosophical, very subtle and inspiring work, without which it is simply impossible to understand and experience the paintings of the great abstractionist. At the very beginning of the book, Kandinsky divides all artists into 2 types, based on the definitions of Robert Schumann and Leo Tolstoy. The composer believed that “the calling of an artist is to send light into the depths of the human heart,” and the writer called the artist the person “who can draw and write anything.” The second definition is alien to Kandinsky; he himself calls such people “artisans” whose work is not filled with meaning and has no value.
“There is a crack in our soul, and the soul, if it can be touched, sounds like a cracked precious vase found in the depths of the earth.”
Music has always had a great influence on the artist, since it is the only absolutely abstract art that makes our imagination work, avoiding objectivity. Just as notes form a beautiful melody, so Kandinsky’s colors in their combination give birth to amazing paintings. The overture of Richard Wagner's opera inspired the aspiring artist the most. After meeting her, Kandinsky wondered whether he could create a painting with the same strong emotional content as the work of the great composer, “in which the colors would become notes, and the color scheme would become the tonality?”
In his search for an answer to this question, Kandinsky was helped by his acquaintance with the Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg. In January 1911, in Munich, the artist heard the atonal works of his future friend and ally and was shocked. Thanks to Schoenberg’s concert, the master’s not yet completely abstract, but already almost non-objective painting “Impression III” was born. Concert". The dark triangle in the picture symbolizes the piano; below you can see the crowd attracted by the music, and the color scheme perfectly reflects that vivid impression, which Kandinsky received at a Schoenberg concert.
Kandinsky was confident that Schoenberg would correctly perceive his philosophy of abstract creativity, and he was not mistaken. The composer supported the artist in his endeavors with color experiments and the search for “anti-logical” harmony, in which feelings, rather than plot, would come first. But not all artists shared this point of view, which led to a split among artists and the creation of a community of like-minded abstractionists, the Blue Horseman. Teaming up with artists August Macke, Franz Marc and Robert Delaney and, of course, composer Arnold Schoenberg, Kandinsky finally finds himself in an environment that promotes the transition to complete abstraction in his work, the search for new forms and color combinations.
“In general, color is a means by which one can directly influence the soul. Color is the key; eye - hammer; the soul is a multi-string piano. The artist is the hand that, through this or that key, expediently sets the human soul into vibration.”
It is impossible to argue with Kandinsky in this statement, because many modern research proves that color influences even our primitive desires and states: everyone knows that red stimulates appetite, green calms us down, and yellow adds vigor and energy to us. And by combining different colors and shapes in a painting, you can influence deeper feelings. This is what the great artist wanted to achieve. Kandinsky's experiments influenced many artists of the early 20th century, including Paul Klee, who before meeting the founder of the Blue Rider was a graphic artist who avoided multi-colored paintings, and after that was known for his delicate, in some sense naive watercolors . The Swiss shared the abstract artist's love of music and his idea that art should evoke strong emotions, help a person listen to the inner self and gain an understanding of the processes occurring in the environment.
“Art does not reproduce what is visible, but makes visible what is not always so.” (c) Paul Klee
It was with this message that Kandinsky began to paint his paintings after 1911. For example, in our Tretyakov Gallery you can see one of the artist’s most significant and large-scale works, written in 1913 - “Composition VII”. The artist does not give any clues to the plot: in the picture there is only color and shape, distributed on a huge canvas (the work is considered the largest of all Kandinsky’s works - 2x3m). The scale made it possible to place fragments of different intensity and color in the painting: sharp-angled, thin, mostly dark elements in the center and smoother shapes and delicate colors around the perimeter allow us to experience different sensations when looking at the same picture. The dark tones on the right contrast with the light in this painting, with circles with fuzzy edges cut through by hard, straight lines. Kandinsky's compositions are a combination of the incongruous, a search for harmony in chaos; these are works that are more like music, since they are the most abstract. It is these works that are considered the main conductors of the artist’s philosophy and the culmination of all his work.
Also realizing that most people need hints to understand his art, Kandinsky continues to write his “Improvisations”, in which subtle (and in individual works and quite obvious) thread connecting abstraction with reality, thanks to concrete elements. For example, in several paintings we can see images of boats and ships: this motif appears when the artist wants to tell us about how a person fights with the world around him, as if sailing ships resist waves and the elements.
In some paintings we can hardly distinguish the masts, as, for example, in the painting “Improvisation 2 8 ( Sea battle)", created on the eve of the First World War, while in other canvases the image of the ship is visible at first glance, as in "Improvisation 209", written in 1917, when the spirit of revolution was felt throughout Russia.
Another frequent element found in the Improvisations are the horsemen, who characterize the aspirations of the people. The image of warriors on horseback was of particular significance for Kandinsky as a man who constantly fought against established norms and canons for the sake of his beliefs. It is no coincidence that the name of the club of creative like-minded abstractionists contains this allegory.
While Kandinsky's "Compositions" are thought out to the smallest detail, and the arrangement of figures and the use certain colors are absolutely conscious, then when writing “Improvisations” the artist was guided by processes of an internal nature, showing his sudden unconscious emotions.
Noticeable changes in creative path Wassily Kandinsky take place during his return to Moscow in 1914. As a citizen of Russia, the artist was forced to leave Germany during the war and continue to make art in his homeland. From 1914 to 1921, he lived in Moscow and promoted his ideas to the masses, collaborated with the government in preparing museum reform, developed artistic pedagogy and was inspired by his hometown.
"Moscow: duality, complexity, highest degree mobility, collision and confusion of individual elements of appearance... I consider this external and internal Moscow the starting point of my quest. Moscow is my picturesque tuning fork"
During his stay in Russia, the artist rushed between different genres and even depicted Moscow in sufficient detail (relative to all of his work), and at some point he returned to impressionistic sketches.
Throughout the creative path of Wassily Kandinsky, we see many different genres, techniques and subjects. In the same year, an artist could create both a fairly concrete work with a meaning understandable to the general public and a complete abstraction. This fact emphasizes the versatility of his personality, the desire for new knowledge and techniques and, of course, the constant development of the creative genius within himself. An artist, teacher, music connoisseur, writer and, of course, philosopher of the art world, Wassily Kandinsky leaves no one indifferent, because his main task was to make people feel, experience, and experience emotions. And he achieved this goal thanks to cultural heritage which he left to future generations.
Where to see Kandinsky's paintings in Russia?
- Astrakhan Art Gallery them. B. M. Kustodieva
- Yekaterinburg Museum fine arts
- Krasnodar regional Art Museum them. F. Kovalenko
- Krasnoyarsk Museum of Fine Arts
- State Tretyakov Gallery on Crimean Val, Moscow
- State Museum of Fine Arts named after. A.S. Pushkin, Moscow
- Nizhny Novgorod State Art Museum
- Ryazan State Regional Art Museum named after. I.P. I'm sorry
- State Hermitage Museum, Main Headquarters, Saint Petersburg
- Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
- Museum complex of the Tyumen region
In 1889 he took part in an ethnographic expedition in the Vologda province, where he met folk art and iconography.
In 1893, after graduating from the university with a 1st degree diploma, he was left at the department of political economy and statistics, in 1895 he wrote a dissertation, but left science and devoted himself to art.
He refused a professorship at the University of Dorpat in Estonia and in 1896 went to Munich to study painting. Kandinsky studied at the school of Anton Ashbe, and in 1900 he moved to the Academy of Arts in the class of the artist and sculptor Franz Stuck.
In 1901, Kandinsky founded the Phalanx art society, which organized exhibitions of young artists; In 1902 he became president of the society. In 1902, Kandinsky also became a member of the Berlin Secession, an association of artists and sculptors.
In the early 1900s, the artist traveled extensively throughout Europe and North Africa, came to Russia, but chose Munich (1902-1908) as his permanent residence, then the town of Murnau in the Bavarian Alps.
IN early work Kandinsky used impressions from nature as the basis for creating colorful landscapes ("The Blue Rider", 1903). The middle and second half of the 1900s were marked by a passion for Russian antiquity. In the paintings “Song of the Volga” (1906), “Motley Life” (1907), “Rock” (1909), the artist combined the rhythmic and decorative features of Russian and German Art Nouveau with the techniques of pointillism (the manner of painting with separate, unisolated strokes) and stylization of folk popular prints.
Kandinsky also worked in the fields of decorative applied arts(sketches of women's jewelry, furniture fittings), plastic arts (modeling in clay), experimented with painting on glass.
During this period, he performed albums of engravings “Poems without Words” (1904) and “Woodcuts” (1909). Exhibited at the Berlin Secession (since 1902), the Paris Salon d'Automne (1904-1912) and the Salon of Independents (since 1908), participated in group exhibitions in Munich, Dresden, Hamburg, Berlin, Warsaw, Rome and Paris, as well as in Moscow (from 1902, 1906) and St. Petersburg (1904, 1906).
At the same time, he wrote correspondence about artistic life Munich for the magazines "World of Art" (1902) and "Apollo" (1909-1910).
In 1909, Kandinsky headed the Munich New Art Society, created as a result of the refusal of the organizers of the Secession to accept innovative works. In 1911, due to aesthetic differences, he left the society and, together with the German painter Franz Marc, created the Blue Rider association. In 1912, he published an almanac of the same name, which became the program document of the artistic avant-garde.
In 1911, Kandinsky painted his first abstract watercolor; in 1911-1913 he painted a series of non-objective paintings, “Impressions,” “Improvisations,” and “Compositions.”
In 1912, Kandinsky published the book “On the Spiritual in Art,” in which he gave the first theoretical justification for abstract art; sent a report of the same name to the All-Russian Congress of Artists in St. Petersburg (December 1911 - January 1912).
In 1913 he published the poetry book Klänge ("Sounds"), accompanied by woodcuts.
In October 1912, the artist’s first personal exhibition took place in the gallery of the Berlin association Der Sturm. The association's publishing house published his album of paintings Rückbliсke, as well as a number of theoretical works.
At the beginning of the First World War (1914-1918), Kandinsky returned to Russia. After October revolution In 1917 he was busy mainly with the reorganization of artistic life. In 1918, he joined the Board of Fine Arts of the People's Commissariat for Education, in 1919 he became a member of the International Bureau of Fine Arts of the People's Commissariat for Education, one of the organizers and scientific secretary of the Museum of Pictorial Culture in Petrograd.
In 1920 he was director of the Institute artistic culture(INHUK) in Moscow and a professor at Moscow University, in 1921 - vice president Russian Academy artistic sciences. Participated in a number of artist exhibitions.
At the end of 1921, Kandinsky was sent to Berlin to create the international department of the Academy of Artistic Sciences and decided not to return to Russia.
In 1922, at the suggestion of the architect Walter Gropius, he taught wall painting and theory of form in training center"Bauhaus" in Weimar (Association of the Weimar Academy of Art and the School of Applied Arts; since 1925 - in Dessau).
In the Bauhaus, the artist was the leader of abstract art.
In the 1920-1930s, Kandinsky created an album of prints "Small Worlds" (1923), abstract scenery for "Pictures at an Exhibition" by Modest Mussorgsky for the theater in Dessau (1928), a design project
Music room for the International Architecture Exhibition in Berlin (1931).
He annually held personal exhibitions in Europe and the USA, participated together with Jawlensky, Feininger and Klee in exhibitions of the Blue Four group, in international exhibitions and exhibitions of Russian art.
During this period, he wrote the book “Point and Line on a Plane” (1926), which was translated into several languages.
In 1933, after the closure of the Bauhaus by the Nazis, Kandinsky received French citizenship in 1939.
In Germany, his works were demonstrated for propaganda purposes at the exhibition “Degenerate Art” (1937), and then removed from museums.
In 1936-1944, Kandinsky held solo exhibitions at the J. Bucher gallery in Paris, exhibited at the Neumann gallery, the Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum in New York, and the Guggenheim Gallery in London.
In November-December 1944, the artist’s last lifetime personal exhibition took place in Paris.
December 13, 1944 Wassily Kandinsky, near Paris in France. He was buried in the cemetery in Neuilly.
Kandinsky was officially married twice. In 1892 he married his cousin Anna Chemyakina, the marriage ended in the early 1900s and was dissolved in 1911. In 1917 in Moscow, he married Nina Andreevskaya (1893 or 1899-1980), the daughter of an officer. In the same year, their son Vsevolod was born, who soon died. After the death of her husband, Nina Kandinskaya sold and donated his paintings to museums, organized memorial exhibitions, and in 1973 published a book of memoirs, “Kandinsky and Me.” In the early 1970s, she bought a house in Switzerland, where she was killed by a robber on September 2, 1980 (the crime remained unsolved). According to her will, 150 of her husband's paintings went to the Museum of Modern Art in Paris (Center Pompidou).
Also close friend the artist was his student Gabriela Munter. Promising to marry her, on the eve of the First World War he left Germany, leaving his works and papers in the care of Munter. After his return with his young wife in 1921, Münter refused to return the paintings. On her 80th birthday, Münter donated all of her paintings to the Lenbachhaus gallery in Munich.
Currently Kandinsky. At auctions, his creations are valued at tens of millions of dollars.
In 2007, the Kandinsky Prize was established in Russia - one of the most important national awards in the field of contemporary art.
The material was prepared based on information from RIA Novosti and open sources
An artist of new art, an abstractionist who survived wars and revolutions. The Bolsheviks called his painting “degenerate.” In his work “On the Spiritual in Art”, Kandinsky reveals the psychological effect of pure color on a person and finds a connection between painting and music. Kandinsky is a master of “compositions”, “improvisations” and “impressions”.
Wealthy, prosperous family with early years supported Wassily Kandinsky's aspirations for art. However, in the future he was supposed to become a lawyer. The young man brilliantly graduated from Moscow University, after which he taught.
The fate of Wassily Kandinsky again returned him to art, when in 1895 an exhibition of French impressionists took place. Wassily Kandinsky was amazed by Monet’s work “Haystacks”. Leaving the University, he went to Munich to study painting. At that time, Munich was considered the center European art, in 1892, a modernist association of artists was organized - Secession.
The Russian artist studied for two years with the Yugoslav painter Anton Ashbe, becoming more and more interested in creativity rather than technique. The first impressionist works were particularly distinguished color scheme, Kandinsky gave great importance not the form, the color of the picture. Later, when Kandinsky took lessons from the famous Franz Von Stuck (Secession artist), he had to leave his bright palette and paint in black and white, studying form. These requirements were set by the teacher, who considered Kandinsky a good student, but who did not have the ability to create bright colors.
Kandinsky spent four years in Munich, but no works from that time remain. It remains a mystery what their fate was, whether they were destroyed by the artist or lost.
Having completed his studies at the age of 35, Wassily Kandinsky created his own movement of abstract artists called “Phalanx”, which made him the leader of the Munich brotherhood of artists. In 1901, the first exhibition of the association took place in Berlin, which presented the works of the Impressionists and the revelations of the German Jugendstil. At this time, the artist met the young artist Gabriela Munter and divorced his wife. For 5 years he traveled with Gabriela around Europe, painting and participating in exhibitions.
In 1908, Kandinsky and Gabriela returned to Munich; it so happened that they settled near the studio of the artist Paul Klee. Ten years later they worked together at the Bauhaus, becoming like-minded people. Gabriela bought a house and they lived in it for 6 years. The house was located in Marnau, near the foot of the Bavarian Alps. This period became the most productive in the artist’s life. The artist increasingly moved from concrete images to abstraction.
In 1911, together with his friend the artist Franz Marc, Kandinsky organized the Blue Rider group. The artists were able to organize only two exhibitions.
In 1912, the first personal exhibition took place. The viewer did not accept Kandinsky's paintings, which plunged him into deep despondency.
Started World War and Kandinsky moved from Germany to Switzerland. Here he began work on the book “The Point and the Line.” By November 1914, he broke up with Gabriela and went to Moscow; the artist did not paint for almost two years.
In 1916, Kandinsky met Nina Andreevskaya, the daughter of a Russian general, and a year later he married her. Having received an inheritance after the death of his father, the artist immediately lost his means of subsistence; the Bolsheviks confiscated all his property. Finding himself below the poverty line, Kandinsky fell into despair. His wife's enthusiasm saved Kandinsky. He begins work at the People's Commissariat of Education, becoming the head of the cinema and theater section. Then he was invited to Moscow University as a professor, at the same time organizing the Institute of Artistic Culture. Thanks to Kandinsky, about 22 art galleries in Russia. But, unfortunately, all Kandinsky’s efforts to find himself in his country were not crowned with success, abstractionism was declared “decadent”, and Kandinsky was called a “minion of the bourgeoisie.” And in 1921, having received an offer for a teaching position at the Bauhaus in Weimar, Kandinsky left the country.
The fate of the Bauhaus was difficult. In 1924, for political reasons, the school came under attack and had to be moved to Dessau, where it existed until 1932. Under pressure from local Nazis, the school was moved to Berlin. In April 1833 it was finally closed. Kandinsky and his wife leave Germany for safety reasons; they settle in the suburbs of Paris.
Wassily Kandinsky heard a lot of criticism addressed to him; galleries did not take the artist’s works. But, despite everything, the artist worked until the end of his life, remaining devoted to creativity.
Famous works of Wassily Vasilyevich Kandinsky
The painting “Improvisation 21A” was painted by a Russian artist in 1911 and is located in State Gallery Lenbachhaus, in Munich. The painting was painted during the period when Kandinsky became an abstractionist. Essentially, this is the artist’s reaction to the world around him, based on impressions and intuition.
At first glance, it seems that the picture is completely abstracted from real objects, but if you look closely, images begin to emerge. For example, a mountain is visible in the center. Bright color spots are outlined with a black outline - characteristic Kandinsky's paintings throughout his subsequent work. Another specific image is a stylized human figure in an unnatural position.
The painting “In Gray” was made in 1919 and is located in National Museum contemporary art, at the Center. J. Pompidou, in Paris. It can be counted among the paintings of the “Russian period” (1915-21). This painting marked the end of Kandinsky's period of study of the interaction of forms. The artist conceived a “composition” consisting of images - mountains, figures of people, boats. Upon completion of the work, the painting turned into an abstraction with a softer color compared to previous works.
In the painting, strict geometric figures are replaced by biomorphic forms, typical of the artist’s painting in Paris years. The color sounds in muted gray, brown and blue shades. The composition gives way to chaos.
The painting “Vibration” was completed in 1925 and is located in the Tate Gallery, London. The painting depicts geometric figures, which the artist writes about in “Point and Line.”
Contact between sharp triangle and all around produces no less an effect than the finger of God extended to Adam in Michelangelo’s painting.
V. Kandinsky
The brightest object is a chessboard. The complex structure is achieved by the unity of shape and color. The painting itself is done in muted colors. Tension is conveyed through the juxtaposition of shapes and colors. Circles dominate as inexhaustible hidden possibilities (Kandinsky).
The painting “Up” was painted in 1929, from the collection of Peggy Guggenheim, in Venice. During the Bauhaus period, the artist mainly painted paintings consisting of geometric shapes. “Up” is an image of a person made up of geometric shapes. Here you can see the influence of Paul Klee's painting. The theory of “Points and lines on a plane” is traced. When Kandinsky painted backgrounds, he sought to break out of the tight framework into which he had driven himself at the Bauhaus. What he succeeded later in Paris.
Masterpiece of Kandinsky V.V. – painting “Detail for Composition IV”
The painting was executed in 1910 and is located in the Tate Gallery, London. The second name is “Cossacks”. The artist himself said that he took the plot of this painting from the events of the 1905 revolution, when Cossacks galloped through the streets of Moscow. In front of the viewer are two fighting Cossacks, below them is a rainbow, forming a road leading to a palace on a blue hill. On the right are three more Cossacks. Two of them have spades. Elements of the picture are difficult to recognize, which forces the viewer to stare at the images for a long time, gradually immersing themselves in the plot. Abstraction involves abstraction from real forms and creative expression in geometric elements.
Wassily Kandinsky faced many trials. He was able to survive wars and revolutions, a dictatorial regime. His art was not understood, which caused outrage from critics.
1911 marks the emergence of Kandinsky as an abstractionist. He calls his works compositions, impressions, improvisations. A classic example is the canvas “Improvisation 21A”. This abstract composition, but if you look closely, you can see real objects. For example, in the central part you can see a mountain with a tower. Clear black lines surround areas of intense color. Such lines will become fundamental in Kandinsky’s work.
One of the rare oil paintings is “In Gray”. It was conceived as a composition with mountains, boats and human figures. But on the final canvas these objects and figures are almost indistinguishable. Everything is reduced to abstract hieroglyphs. The painting reflects the artist’s desire for a thoughtful composition of pictorial space. The master's palette becomes softer. Muted grays, browns, blue tones characteristic of the so-called Russian period of Kandinsky’s work. Having left for Germany, the colors become uniform and flat.
The painting “Vibration” was created in Weimar. There are a lot of geometric shapes here. A notable element is the chessboard. The triangle interacts with the circle. The opposition of shapes and colors is conveyed. In general, the composition is sufficient, solid and thoughtful, and the unity of color and shape created a complex structure. The palette, other than the checkerboard, is muted.
In his abstract painting, Kandinsky uses real objects, but conveys them using geometric shapes. For example, the painting “Cossacks”. The plot is inspired during the revolution of 1905, when Cossacks galloped around Moscow. The canvas specifically depicts two Cossacks, with a rainbow underneath them forming the road leading to the palace on the hill. Kandinsky does not strive for objects to be clearly recognizable; he wants the viewer to be imbued with spirituality. At this time, he is searching for a new language with which he could express a new worldview. Forms crumble before our eyes, leaving behind only traces.
Kandinsky's whole path is, first of all, evolution. He started with general discussions about spirituality, but later the specifics came. He develops a mathematical theory plastic arts, which is based on the interaction of geometric shapes on a person, and their relationship with color in painting.
Works of Vasily Vasilyevich Kandinsky
(1866-1944)
The work of Vasily Vasilyevich Kandinsky is a unique phenomenon of Russian and European art. It was this artist, endowed with powerful talent, brilliant intellect and subtle spiritual intuition, who was destined to make a real revolution in painting and create the first abstract compositions.
Kandinsky's fate was not entirely ordinary. Until he was thirty, he did not even think about art. Having graduated from the Faculty of Law of Moscow University in 1893, he began working on his dissertation, participated in an ethnographic expedition to the north of Russia, and in 1896 received an invitation from the university in Dorpat (now Tartu, Estonia) to take the position of private assistant professor. But that same year, Kandinsky suddenly changed his life. The reason for this was the impression of the painting “Haystack” by Claude Monet at the French Industrial and Art Exhibition in Moscow. Refusing the department, he went to Germany to study painting. Kandinsky settled in Munich, which at the turn of the century was the recognized center of German Art Nouveau. He studied first at a private painting school, and later at the Munich Academy of Arts under Franz von Stuck.
Living in Germany, Kandinsky came to Russia almost every year and presented his works at exhibitions of the Moscow Association of Artists, the New Society of Artists, etc. His articles about the art of Germany, which played such an important role in the formation of creative personality of the painter. At the same time, Kandinsky was excited and inspired by Russian artistic tradition: icons, ancient temples, fairy tale characters. All of them are often present in his works, which indicates the influence of the “World of Art” masters on him.
Kandinsky was a born leader. Already in 1901, having barely completed his studies, he headed the Phalanx art society, participated in its exhibitions and worked in the school created under it. In 1909, the master organized the “New Munich Art Association”, and in 1912 - the “Blue Rider” group.
In the works of Kandinsky 1900-1910. a variety of influences are felt: from German expressionism and French Fauvism (View of Murnau, 1908; Houses in Murnau on the Obermarkt, 1908) to the Russian World of Art (Ladies in Crinolines, 1909). Not without the influence of symbolism, Kandinsky turned to graphics, creating a series of woodcuts “Poems without Words” (1903).
At the beginning of the 10s. The main direction of Kandinsky’s creative search was clearly defined: he wanted to concentrate all means of painting on conveying a complex system of feelings and sensations that live in the hidden depths of the artist’s soul and do not depend on the material world. Theoretically, the master formulated this problem in the book “Spiritual in Art” (1911), but the practical solution came to him suddenly and unusually. The artist himself described the revolution that took place in his mind in the work “Steps” (1918): “I... suddenly saw in front of me an indescribably beautiful picture, saturated with internal combustion. At first I was amazed, but now I quickly approached this mysterious picture, completely incomprehensible in its external content and consisting exclusively of colorful spots. And the key to the riddle was found: it was my own painting, leaning against the wall and standing on its side... In general, it became indisputably clear to me that day that objectivity is harmful to my paintings.”
Probably, at that moment the shocked master hardly realized that the painting accidentally placed on its side would become the source of a new direction in art - abstractionism. According to Kandinsky, it is the line and color spot, and not the plot, that are the bearers of the spiritual principle; their combinations give rise to an “inner sound” that evokes a response in the viewer’s soul.
All abstract works of Kandinsky, in his own words, are divided into three groups (according to the degree of distance from the subject): impressions, improvisations and compositions. If impression is born as a direct impression from the external world, then improvisation unconsciously expresses internal impressions. Finally, composition is the highest and most consistent form of abstract painting. It has no direct connections with reality. Color spots and lines form a breathtaking element of movement. Kandinsky's compositions did not have individual titles - only numbers (out of ten such works, seven have survived).
By creating abstract compositions, Kandinsky actually changed the nature of painting - an art closely related to storytelling - and brought it closer to music, which is designed not to depict, but to express the most complex mental states
Wassily Kandinsky - Russian artist and art theorist, marked the beginning of a dramatic period in Kandinsky's work and became a harbinger of the emergence of abstract art. He conceived a new style, now known as About the spiritual in art ».
Bauhaus
had a profound influence on the development of modern fine art. He was the one who liberated painting from limiting ideas and created the basis for the evolution of abstract art. His enormous influence on the art world forever changed the way painting was perceived. The artist's works were based on philosophical principles that steadily progressed into painting images.
Kandinsky is, perhaps, first of all a thinker and then an artist. He recognized only the direction in which a rich configuration could move and relentlessly pursued it, setting an example for other avant-garde creators. The essence of Kandinsky's abstraction is the search for a universal synthesis of music and painting, seen as parallels with philosophy and science.
Wassily Kandinsky was born in Moscow in 1866. WITH early childhood he was amazed by the variety of colors in nature, and he was constantly interested in art. Despite his success in studying economics and law, he abandoned a promising career in the social sciences to pursue a creative vocation.
The exhibition of Claude Monet, which the young artist visited, became a decisive impetus that inspired him to devote himself to the study of fine art. When he entered art school in Munich, Kandinsky was already 30 years old. Even without being accepted the first time, he continued his independent studies.
Vasily Vasilyevich spent two years at art school, after which a period of wandering followed. The artist visited the Netherlands, France, Italy and Tunisia. At that time, he created paintings heavily influenced by Post-Impressionism, reliving his childhood in Russia in creative landscapes that had an idealistic meaning for the artist. He settled in the town of Murnau, near Munich, and continued to explore landscapes, giving them energetic lines and bold, hard colors.
Kandinsky thought about music, trying to convey its abstract features in other forms of art. In 1911, a group of like-minded artists led by Kandinsky was formed in Munich. They called themselves " The Blue Rider - Der Blaue Reiter" Among the participants were such famous German expressionists as August Macke and Franz Marc. The group published an almanac with their own views on modern Art and held two exhibitions before disbanding at the outbreak of the First World War in 1914.
Transition to use The transition to the use of basic pictorial elements marked the beginning of a dramatic period in Kandinsky's work and became a harbinger of the emergence of abstract art. He conceived a new style, now known as lyrical abstraction. The artist, through drawing and sketching, imitated the flow and depth of a musical work, the coloring reflected the theme of deep contemplation. In 1912 he wrote and published the seminal study "About the spiritual in art ».
In 1914, Kandinsky had to return to Russia, but he did not stop experimenting. He even participated in the restructuring of Russian art institutions after the revolution. But the true significance of his ingenious innovation became apparent only in 1923 after he returned to Germany and joined the teaching corps. Bauhaus", where he became friends with another creative avant-garde artist, Paul Klee.
Kandinsky worked on a new pictorial formula consisting of lines, dots and combined geometric figures, representing his visual and intellectual explorations. Lyrical abstraction shifted towards a more structured, scientific composition.
After ten years of fruitful work, the Bauhaus school was closed by the Nazi authorities in 1933. Kandinsky was forced to move to France, where he spent the rest of his life.
The Russian genius has devoted the last eleven years to the constant pursuit of a great synthesis of his abstract ideas and visual discoveries. He returned to intense color and lyricism, once again confirming his original views on the true nature of painting. great artist took French citizenship and created a number of famous works of art in his new homeland. He died in 1944 in Neuilly at the age of 77.
The new Nazi authorities in 1937 declared the works of Wassily Kandinsky, like those of his contemporaries Marc Chagall, Paul Klee, Franz Marc and Piet Mondrian, to be “degenerate art”, and two years later more than a thousand paintings and thousands of sketches were publicly burned in the atrium of a fire station in Berlin. However, the compelling power of Wassily Kandinsky's iconic artworks has not faded under historical pressures and has emerged victorious on the stage of art history.
1. "Sequence", 1935
This is practically a musical work, marking the late period in Kandinsky's work. Closed fields with scattered elements of the composition flowing into certain forms. The artist returned to his abstract roots.
2. “The Blue Rider”, 1903
This painting served as inspiration for the creation of one of the most influential groups in the history of modern art - Der Blaue Reiter. This early work written on the verge of abstraction.
3. Beach Baskets in Holland, 1904
Landscape borrowed from a trip to the Netherlands. The scene is supposedly influenced by Impressionism.
4. “Autumn in Murnau”, 1908
The gradual transition to abstraction is marked by expressionism in landscape.
5. “Akhtyrka. Red Church", 1908
Russian landscape, in which the artist resurrected his homesickness.
6. “Mountain”, 1909
An almost entirely abstract landscape with small outlines suggesting a hill and human figures.
7. “First abstract watercolor”, 1910
This work has historical value as Kandinsky's first completely abstract watercolor.
8. “Improvisation 10”, 1910
Improvisation in drawing and color gives clues, but does not fully reveal or specify the images. Early abstraction.
9. “Lyrical”, 1911
In his painting, the artist often relied on musical ideas, so the lyrical nature of his brushstrokes came naturally. This is one of his "poems of art".
10. “Composition IV”, 1911
There is a story that Kandinsky thought he had completed the painting, but as soon as his assistant accidentally turned it the other way, the perspective and overall impression of the painting changed, making it beautiful.
11. “Improvisation 26 (Rowing)”, 1912
Kandinsky often named his paintings in the manner of musical works - improvisation and composition.
12. “Improvisation 31 (Battleship)”, 1913
A typical example of lyrical abstraction with strong color and emotional content.
13. “Squares with concentric circles", 1913
Already a real deep abstraction. Thus, Kandinsky conducted research in the field of color and geometry.
14. “Composition VI”, 1913
After extensive preparation for this painting, Kandinsky completed it within three days, repeating it like a mantra for inspiration. german word"uberflut" meaning flood.
15. “Moscow”, 1916
During his stay in Moscow during the war years, Kandinsky was struck by the bustle of the big city. This is more of a portrait of the capital than a landscape, reflecting all its power and turbulence.
16. “Blue”, 1922
Another study of color in a very limited geometric form.
17. "Black and Violet", 1923
One of the paintings painted after returning to Germany. We still see rich colors in the composition, but a distinctly sharp geometric twist pushes aside the lyrical brushstrokes.
18. “On White II”, 1923
Visual representation based on two main nuances - black and white. The two opposites create a strong contrast, maintaining tension in the painting, which simulates the struggle between life and death.
19. “Yellow, Red, Blue,” 1925
As the name suggests, it is primarily an exploration of the potential of primary colors that decorate a geometric composition.
20. “Composition X”, 1939
This picture was also painted under the influence of music. The visual elements are proportional to the musical components of the ideal symphony. Kandinsky believed that this was the secret of true painting
