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Farbstudie Quadrate, c.1913 Art Print Kandinsky,... 27.563 in. x 19.688 in. Buy at AllPosters.com Framed Mounted The immediate precursors of abstract art, as we know, were Fauvism and Cubism. The influence of the Fauves was decisive in the case of Kandinsky, Mondrian, whereas training was supplemented by that of the Cubists. 1906 and 1912 are two important dates here. The first was not only the year of death of Cézanne, whose influence on cubism at the beginning has been fully explored, it was also the year that Bergson's Creative Evolution appeared, and when Kandinsky spent a long stay in or near Paris.
There he sustained the shock of the Fauves and Gauguin Full (thanks to the Gauguin retrospective at the Salon d'Automne, showing 227 pieces). It was after his stay in Paris this year (or rather Sevres) that Kandinsky emerged from the New Secession style that characterized his earlier work, and began to assert an independent person. Regarding the year 1912, he found Mondrian in Paris, without reservation, submission to the influence of Cubism which was to lead quickly to works that were remarkably mature in their abstraction, and whose originality been noticed both by Apollinaire.
Both Kandinsky and Mondrian were older in years than the Cubists and the Fauves. What he has discovered - apparently by accident - found a ready soil in the Russian and Dutch painters, both painstakingly prepared by their previous experiences technical as well as a certain amount of philosophical speculation. Braque, Picasso, Leger, Matisse and Delaunay are painters first. Kandinsky and Mondrian were both painters and thinkers, for whom the problems of art could not be addressed outside of the other man's problems. They aim not only to renew the paint, but he thinks that man must be transformed and that the whole of humanity is moving towards an age of material and spiritual improvement. The artist appeared to them the best qualified person for the preparation and heralding a golden age. That is why the work painted and the paint man must be identical. The evolution of art is unthinkable without a parallel development in the inner man himself. Fauves and Cubists painters are and have no intention of being taken for something else, as Kandinsky and Mondrian are prophets.
In Russia, Kandinsky had originally pursued a career as a scientist. It turned to painting when he approached his thirties, driven by a genuine "inner necessity" which had repressed in recent years. In his writings on the philosophy of art during his Munich period "inner necessity" the word kept coming, and had an important role to play. It is on this basis that any aesthetic justification of his work, after it had already been used to justify his career as a painter. After the necessary preliminaries (Studies in Munich Academies, a few trips instructive) and once he had completed his philosophy of art, Kandinsky threw himself into an orgy of production. A confusing world of shapes and colors swarmed with his brush, apparently delirious. Was it delirium or ecstasy? This spectacular stage in the abstraction of Kandinsky still surprises us by its overflow rough, his lyrical resonance, its violence Wagnerian full Clarion-calls. It is the "Durchbruch", a break or, more precisely through a demolition, the battering ram on the walls of traditional painting.
After a few years, this generous force gradually subsided. In about 1921 Kandinsky came to accept the geometric studies of Malevich and the Russian Constructivists. His painting and then gradually changed outwardly, but his inventiveness lost none of its richness, density and heat. For once the presence of Klee could be felt in his work, which began to show touches of humor, and we do not claim that this was the least satisfactory part of its production. After 1933, he moved to Neuilly, live in a bright and comfortable apartment on the banks of the Seine, where he painted pictures which, for the most part, are brilliant variations on themes which he had long been partial. This period has often been called one of the "great synthesis", which is accurate enough as it is not taken to include the period drama, which finds no echo in it.
Mondrian period of preparation lasted much longer. Between taking his first art-education degree and his arrival in Paris a few years went by twentythree, but they were fruitful years. Rather later Kandinsky, he worked at his own philosophy of art, and De Stijl movement was founded on it. At the opposite pole of Kandinsky, his painting was the further simplification, the key measure of the economy and, at least once Cubism had shown him the way. Cubism, he shot an unexpected lesson, which was pure rhythm that can be reduced to a horizontal-vertical movement. There was only one step from that of the RightAngle. It took several years to make this step, painting and meditation, then he laid the cornerstone of his system, which is the language of painting (and the language of life itself) can be condensed in the dualism of the square wave voltage of two straight lines being in a relationship horizontalvertical.
This is what makes one possible construction. This was the birth of neoplasticism. Until the end of his life, that is to say, for thirty years, Mondrian has never diverged from this principle, advancing slowly towards an imaginary perfection that was always in arms reach but always a little further. It was his own expression. "Do not you think, anyway, it's just a little further?" he asked a friend, pointing to the last painting, which, as always, must surely be an improvement on the previous. Perhaps it is precisely in the last picture he ever painted, unfinished victory boogie-woogie, he came closest to this imaginary perfection. The least we can say that before his work is that we feel to be in the presence of a wonderful synthesis, fully alive to deny anything yet neoplastic fundamental principle.
Mondrian and Kandinsky represent two different aspects of human genius, crystallized into two archetypes, infinite patience and holy impatience. According to our temperament, we will be drawn toward one or the other, or perhaps to each in turn. If genius is something like the work of a bee, the fall of the distillation by the fall of a single species and all inclusive, so we will encourage Mondrian. But if the mind is restless and many, if truth is progressing by leaps immense, if creation is a crazy sparkling treasures, the overflow of a primal unfathomable reason, then we will choose Kandinsky and see in him the Ariel of abstract painters.
Outwardly these two great personalities are not unlike, and avoid or eccentric manners of skins and preferring the good turnout for the skilled than the bohemian. But Mondrian threadbare elegance hiding a dark, lonely existence, while Kandinsky never wanted money, comfort or recognition. They were both courteous and distinguishedlooking and had a certain reserve that alludes to a shy child. But they had little in common and rarely met, so politely, in Paris in 1930 and after 1933.
Kandinsky merit lies in showing what wonders can be wrung from true freedom, and that the limits of the canvas can do more. Mondrian is its lesson of discipline and humility. Reduce art to its simplest data already used, he showed how selfless spiritual stature grows and how the poorest the means are the purest, often the strongest.
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