Wassily Kandinsky
Concerning the spiritual in art

 
Abstract:
Kandinsky’s book 'Concerning the spiritual in art' was published by Piper in December 1911, with the date 1912, and ran through three editions in the period from Christmas 1911 to autumn 1912. This may be taken as some indication of the extent to which Kandinsky’s thoughts and ideas touched on notions that were of enormous general interest. Since the turn of the 20th century, a great change in science and art had been in progress, altering the entire intellectual milieu of the time. Kandinsky, who was interested not only in art but also in science and philosophy, absorbed knowledge of new subjects and integrated it into his theories on art. The time in which Kandinsky lived was a period of great tension between logic and intuition, science and art. As a result of his background as a lawyer and political economist, and his subsequent work as a painter, Kandinsky himself was likewise positioned between opposing poles and was constantly striving to integrate the two perspectives, without losing sight of either. In his paintings – which he perceived as an expression of abstract painting – the result of this was an oscillation between improvisation and composition. Kandinsky argued repeatedly that both the artist and the observer must be gradually brought closer to the abstraction, so that the various layers of meaning held in a non-representational painting are not lost. This emphasis on the processual appears as an intrinsic feature of both Kandinsky’s theoretical work and his painting.