Wassily Kandinsky1866-1944

• At a young age, Kandinsky learned to play the piano and the cello and took to drawing with a coach. 

"I remember that drawing and a little bit later painting lifted me out of the

reality"

“Each color lives by its mysterious life". 

Claude Monet

Haystacks (Morning Snow Effect)

1891

Oil on canvas

“I noticed with surprise and confusion that the picture not only gripped me, but impressed itself ineradicably on my memory. “

~ Kandinsky

Blue Rider1903

Oil on cardboard55х65 cm

Couple Riding. 1906Oil on canvas, 55х50.5 cm

• 1911: Formed an artist group, known as The Blue Rider.– The name Blaue Reiter (“blue rider”) refers to

a key motif in Kandinsky’s work: the horse and rider, which was for him a symbol for moving beyond realistic representation.

The Blue Rider Manifesto

• The Blue Rider.– They shared an interest in

abstracted forms and prismatic colors, which, they felt, had spiritual values that could counteract the corruption and materialism of their age. The flattened perspective and reductive forms of woodcut helped put the artists, especially Kandinsky, on the path toward abstraction in their painting.

Franz Marc

Blue Horse

1911

Oil on canvas

Wassily Kandinsky

Blue Rider

1911

Oil on canvas

• During this period, Kandinsky was also similarly influenced by: Richard Wagner's Lohengrin which, he felt, pushed the limits of music and melody beyond standard lyricism

"Colour is the key. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano with its many chords. The artist is the hand that, by touching this or that key, sets the soul vibrating automatically."

~ Kandinsky

Impression lll (Concert)1911

Oil on canvas77.5х100 cm

Impression lll (Concert)1911

Oil on canvas77.5х100 cm

This picture portrays Kandinsky’s overall impression of a musical performance that nonetheless has its origins in the significant experience of the concert.

The large black form dominating the painting—though compact and recognizable at the concrete level as a grand piano—seems to float weightlessly. An amorphous yellow patch flows around it, surges into the foreground as the key of the sound or the music, and encircles and penetrates the listeners, who are denoted by dashes of color and hook-shaped lines. The audience is attracted in turn by the dynamic of the black form. In this way, using just a few concrete signs,Kandinsky visualized the effect of the music.

• Kandinsky viewed music as the most transcendent form of non-objective art -- musicians could evoke images in listeners' minds merely with sounds. He strove to produce similarly object-free, spiritually rich paintings that alluded to sounds and emotions through a unity of sensation.

• Kandinsky used the terms:–  Impression to describe paintings that

reproduce a direct impression of external nature

– Improvisations, by contrast, are paintings that replicate impressions of an internal nature

– Compositions are elaborate impressions of an internal nature, but are created more slowly and with greater deliberation.

Improvisation 21a1911

Oil on canvas96х105 cm

Improvisation 31 (Sea Battle)1913Oil on canvas145x119.7 cm

Improvisation 31 (Sea Battle)1913Oil on canvas145x119.7 cm

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.

Achieved all this mainly with the color, which bounces and balloons over the center of the picture, roughly curtailed at the upper corners, and ominously smudged at the bottom right. There are also smears, whether of paint or of blood. The action is held tightly within two strong ascending diagonals, creating a central triangle that rises ever higher. This rising accent gives a heroic feel to the violence.

Composition IV

1911

Oil on canvas

159.5 x 250.5cm

The painting is divided abruptly in the center by two thick, black vertical lines. On the left, a violent motion is expressed through the profusion of sharp, jagged and entangled lines. On the right, all is calm, with sweeping forms and color harmonies. Upon closer inspection the apparent abstraction of this work proves illusory. The dividing lines are actually two lances (poles used by warriors) held by red-hatted Cossacks (Russian soldiers). Next to them, a third, white-bearded Cossack leans on his violet sword. They stand before a blue mountain crowned by a castle. In the lower left, two boats are depicted. Above them, two mounted Cossacks are joined in battle, brandishing violet sabers. On the lower right, two lovers recline, while above them two robed figures observe from the hillside. Kandinsky has reduced representation to pictographic signs in order to obtain the flexibility to express a higher, more cosmic vision. The deciphering of these signs is the key to understanding the theme of the work.

Composition IV

1911

Oil on canvas

159.5 x 250.5cm

Composition IV

1911

Oil on canvas

159.5 x 250.5cm

The painting is divided abruptly in the center by two thick, black vertical lines. On the left, a violent motion is expressed through the profusion of sharp, jagged and entangled lines. On the right, all is calm, with sweeping forms and color harmonies. Upon closer inspection the apparent abstraction of this work proves illusory. The dividing lines are actually two lances held by red-hatted Cossacks. Next to them, a third, white-bearded Cossack leans on his violet sword. They stand before a blue mountain crowned by a castle. In the lower left, two boats are depicted. Above them, two mounted Cossacks are joined in battle, brandishing violet sabers. On the lower right, two lovers recline, while above them two robed figures observe from the hillside. Kandinsky has reduced representation to pictographic signs in order to obtain the flexibility to express a higher, more cosmic vision. The deciphering of these signs is the key to understanding the theme of the work.

An awareness of Kandinsky's philosophy leads to a reading of Composition IV as expressing the apocalyptic battle that will end in eternal peace. Composition IV works on multiple levels: initially, the colors and forms exercise an emotional impact over the viewer, without need to consider the representational aspects. Then, the decoding of the representational signs involves the viewer on an intellectual level.

Composition V

1911

Oil on canvas

190 x 275cm

Composition VIII1923

Oil on canvas140х201 cm

Composition IX1936

Oil on canvas113.5х195 cm

• Find out more about Kandinsky at:

http://www.theartstory.org/artist-kandinsky-wassily.htm

Matthew RitchieBorn 1964

Ritchie – The Morning Line

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja2CUVJmQ48

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaoPcJPCqIE

Artistic aim:

To represent the entire universe and the structures of knowledge and belief that we use to understand and visualize it. 

Day One 2008Installations: Jewish Contemporary Museum, San Francisco.

The Universal Adversary

2006

Installation View Andrea Rosen Gallery

Proposition Player

2003Installation view at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Texas

Proposition Player

2003Installation view at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Texas

Self-Portrait in 2064

2003Oil and marker on canvas

80 x 100 inches

No Sign of the World

2004Oil and marker on canvas

99 x 154 inches

The Dead: Belphegor

2004

Ink and graphite on Denril

54 x 36 inches

• Ritchie’s paintings, installations, and narrative threads delineate the universe’s formation as well as the attempts and limits of human consciousness to comprehend its vastness.

• Find out more about Ritchie’s work at:

http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/matthew-ritchie