Vasily Kandinsky One of the founders of Der Blaue Reiter Kandinsky hoped to awaken spirituality and to inaugurate “a great spiritual epoch” through the sheer force of color. He is considered the very first artist to paint completely abstract works of art. The Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky was one of the most significant artists of the early twentieth century, and a pioneer in the development of a new visual language - abstraction. Kandinsky: The Path to Abstraction focuses on the early, exploratory period of his career, as he moved from early observations of landscape towards fully abstract compositions. Kandinsky was born in Moscow in 1866, the son of a wealthy tea merchant. He studied law and economics at the University of Moscow, and taught in the law faculty. It was not until 1896 that he decided to become an artist, prompted by two revelatory experiences. When he saw one of the French Impressionist painter Claude Monet’s paintings of haystacks at an exhibition in Moscow, Kandinsky was stirred by the colour and composition of the work, which he realised was far more important than its depiction of a physical landscape. The other experience was a performance of Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin. Music influenced Kandinsky’s art profoundly: he admired the way it could elicit an emotional response, without being tied to a recognisable subject matter. Painting, he believed, should aspire to be as abstract as music, with groups of colour in a picture relating to one another in a manner analogous to sequences of chords in music.

Vasily Kandinsky Der Blaue Reiter 1903

Vasily Kandinsky Ludwigskirche in Munich 1908 Wassily Kandinsky,Ludwigskirche in Munich 1908 Vasily Kandinsky Ludwigskirche in Munich 1908

Vasily Kandinsky Landscape with Factory Chimney 1910 Wassily Kandinsky,Ludwigskirche in Munich 1908 Vasily Kandinsky Landscape with Factory Chimney 1910

Vasily Kandinsky Composition V 1911 In his seminal treatise On the Spiritual in Art, published in 1911, Kandinsky separated his paintings into three categories. ‘Impressions’ were observations of the natural world. ‘Improvisations’ were spontaneous expressions of a mood or feeling, such as Improvisation 11 (1910) displayed here. ‘Compositions’ were also inner visions, but on a grander, more ambitious scale. The meticulous planning and intricate structure of the Compositions made them analogous to a symphony. Soon after creating his first Composition, Kandinsky became immersed in the new musical theories of the Viennese composer Arnold Schoenberg, with whom he began a longstanding friendship and correspondence. The development of Kandinsky’s art, as he moved towards abstraction, relates to Schoenberg’s innovations in musical composition.   Vasily Kandinsky Composition V 1911

Vasily Kandinsky Composition VII 1913 Composition VII and the closely related Composition VI, in the next room, were painted in quick succession in 1913. His two largest paintings, they embody his complex philosophical and pictorial ideas of that time. Composition VII was the result of two months of preliminary work: Kandinsky made more studies for this composition than for any other – over thirty drawings, watercolours and sketches. However, according to Gabriele Münter, the final version was painted in just three days. Münter took four photographs of the painting at critical stages of its evolution. These, together with the many studies, give an insight into Kandinsky’s working methods and underlying vision. While the final painting appears to be totally non-figurative, the photographs and studies, together with Kandinsky’s own writings, suggest apocalyptic themes of Deluge, Last Judgement, Resurrection and Paradise. It is possible to detect recognisable motifs, such as the boat and oars in the lower left corner, but Kandinsky has deliberately veiled these external, representational elements in favour of the internal, spiritual meaning. Vasily Kandinsky Composition VII 1913

Vasily Kandinsky Fragment 2 for Composition VII 1913

Vasily Kandinsky Improvisation No. 30 1913 Improvisation 30 (Cannons) (1913) evokes the imagery of war. Whilst placing increasing emphasis on lines, shapes and colours to convey emotion, Kandinsky still uses recognisable elements, such as cannons, a castle and a crowd of figures. Although Kandinsky admitted that it was probably the perpetual talk of war that led him to include the cannons, he went on to explain that the painting was not intended as a literal representation. Instead, he said, the recognisable elements in the painting were expressions of what the spectator feels while looking at the painting.

Vasily Kandinsky Blue Segment 1921 Blue Segment (1921), with its combination of different forms, shows Kandinsky’s art at a pivotal moment. Like many of his earlier works, the title focuses on just one section of the painting, in this case the blue segment rather like a crescent moon. The floating, freeform elements of the painting contrast with more hard-edged geometrical shapes – circles, triangles and rectangles. The colours are more muted, prefiguring his later work, when he was to move away from primary colours and explore a wider range of shades.