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Wassily Kandinsky
64 quotes
“Frankly, I think there is something wrong with Jawlensky's dots [in his paintings, then]. Anybody can pick up that style if they want to.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1903 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote of Kandinsky, c 1903; as cited by , in Expressionism; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 114
“The impressions we receive, which often appear merely chaotic, consist of three elements; the impression of the color of the object, its form, and of its combined color and form, i.e., of the object itself. At this point the individuality of the artist comes to the front and disposes, as he wills, these three elements. It is clear, therefore, that the choice of object (i.e., of one of the elements in the harmony of form) must be decided only by a corresponding vibration in the human soul..”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1910 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote of Kandinsky, Munich, 1910; as cited in Artists on Art – from the 14th – 20th centuries, ed. by Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves; Pantheon Books, 1972, London, p. 450
“Mystery, speaking through mysteries. Isn't that meaning? Isn't that the conscious or unconsciousnes purpose of the compulsive urge to create?”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1910 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote, c. 1910; as cited by , in Expressionism; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 112
“Opposites and contradictions, that is our harmony.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1911 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: short quote, 1911; as cited in schönberg and Kandinsky: An Historic Encounter, by Klaus Kropfinger; ed. Konrad Boehmer; published by Routledge (imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informal company), 2003, p. 9, note 1
“Schoenberg's music leads us into a realm where musical experience is a matter not of the ear but of the soul alone, and at this point the music of the future begins.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1911 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote of Kandinsky, 1911; in Concerning the Spiritual in Art, transl. Michael T. Sadler (1914); reprint. New York: Dover, 1977), p. 17
“In your composer Schönberg's works, you have realized what I, albeit in uncertain form, have so greatly longed for in music. The independent progress through their own destinies, the independent life of the individual voices in your compositions, is exactly what I am trying to find in my painting.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1911 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: in his letter to Arnold Schönberg, 18 Jan. 1911; as cited in Schonberg and Kandinsky: An Historic Encounter, by Klaus Kropfinger; edited by Konrad Boehmer; published by Routledge (imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa…
“At the moment there is a great tendency in painting to discover the 'new' harmony by constructive means whereby the rhythmic is built on an almost geometric form.. .I am certain that our own modern harmony is not to be found in the 'geometric' way, but rather in the anti-geometric, anti-logical way. And this way is that of 'dissonance in art', in painting, therefore, just as much as in music. And 'today's' dissonance in painting and music is merely the consonance of 'tomorrow'.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1911 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote in Kandinsky's letter to Arnold Schönberg, 18 Jan. 1911; as cited in Schonberg and Kandinsky: An Historic Encounter, by Klaus Kropfinger; edited by Konrad Boehmer; published by Routledge (imprint of Taylor & Franc…
“..the works of Mozart. They create a welcome pause amidst the storms of our inner life, a vision of consolation and hope, but we hear them like sounds of another, vanished and essential unfamiliar age. Clashing discords, loss of equilibrium..”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1911 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from: On the Spiritual in Art, 1911; as cited in Schönberg and Kandinsky: An Historic Encounter, by Klaus Kropfinger; edited by Konrad Boehmer; published by Routledge (imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informal comp…
“An artist who sees that the imitation of natural appearances, however artistic, is not for him – the kind of creative artist who wants to, and has to express his own inner world – sees with envy how naturally and easily such goals can be attained in music, the least material of the arts today. Understandably, he may turn toward it and try to find the same means in his own art. Hence the current search for rhythm in painting, for mathematical abstract construction.. ..the way colors are set in motion, etc.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1911 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: In: On the Spiritual in Art, 1911; as quoted in Schönberg and Kandinsky: An Historic Encounter, by Klaus Kropfinger; edited by Konrad Boehmer; published by Routledge (imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informal company), 2…
“[Their] things [works of Die Brücke-artists] must be exhibited. But I think it is incorrect to immortalize them in the document [Almanac] of our modern art (and, this is what our book ought to be) or as a more or less decisive, leading factor. At any rate I am against large reproductions [of Die Brücke paintings in The Blaue Reiter Almanac].”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1910 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from his letter to Franz Marc, 2 Febr. 1912, as cited in 'Lankheit 20'; quoted in Movement, Manifesto, Melee: The Modernist Group, 1910-1914, Milton A. Cohen, Lexington Books, Sep 14, 2004, p. 71
“Nor, on the other hand, are there any masculine charms [in Gabriele Münter's work] either: no 'sinewy brushwork', no heaps of paint, 'hurled on to the canvas'. The pictures are painted throughout with a delicately and correctly sensed measure of external strength, with not a trace of feminine or masculine coquetry in the 'making'. We could almost say that they are painted modestly; i. e. that they were inspired, not by a desire for outward display, but by a purely inward compulsion.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1913 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote of Kandinsky, 1913; in the introduction of an exhibition-catalog 'Neue Künstlervereinigung', Munich; as cited by , in Expressionism; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 120
“Of the 16 years that I have been living in Germany, I have given myself entirely to the German art world. How am I now suddenly supposed to feel myself a foreigner?”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1866 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote in his letter to Herwarth Walden [of 'der Sturm'], August 2, 1914; as cited by lrike Becks-Malorny, in Wassily Kandinsky, 1866–1944: The Journey to Abstraction [Cologne: Taschen, 1999], p. 115
“First I will make different color tests: I will study the dark – deep blue, deep violet, deep dirty green, etc. Often I see the colors before my eyes. Sometimes I imitate with my lips the deep sounds of the trumpet – then I see various deep mixtures which the word is uncapable od conceiving and which the palette can only feebly reproduce.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1915 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote in Kandinsky's letter to Gabriele Münter, 1915; as cited in Schönberg and Kandinsky: An Historic Encounter, by Klaus Kropfinger; edited by Konrad Boehmer; published by Routledge (imprint of Taylor & Francis, an in…
“I would love to paint a large landscape of Moscow — taking elements from everywhere and combining them into a single picture—weak and strong parts, mixing everything together in the same way as the world is mixed of different elements. It must be like an orchestra.. .Suddenly I felt that my old dream was closer to coming true. You know that I dreamed of painting a big picture expressing joy, the happiness of life and the universe. Suddenly I feel the harmony of colors and forms that come from this world of joy.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1866 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from Kandinsky's letter to Gabriele Münter, June 1916; as cited in lrike Becks-Malorny, Wassily Kandinsky, 1866–1944: The Journey to Abstraction [Cologne: Taschen, 1999], pp. 115, 118
“I am working again on my painting 'Moscow' ['Moscow I' ('Москва I'), 1916]. It is slowly taking shape in my imagination. And what was in the realm of wishing is now assuming real forms. What I have been lacking with this idea was depth and richness of sound, very earnest, complex, and easy at the same time.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1916 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote in his letter to Gabriele Münter, September 4, 1916; as cited in Hans K. Rothel and Jean K. Benjamin, Kandinsky: Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, Volume Two, 1916–1944; Cornell University Press, Ithaca, N.…
“Kandinsky, Wassily – painter, printmaker and author – the first painter to base painting on purely pictorial means of expression and abandon objects in his pictures.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1919 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote of Wassily Kandinsky, 1919 - his self-characterisation in 'Das Kunstblatt', 1919; as cited in 'Klee & Kandinsky', 2015 exhibition text, Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau Munich, 2015-2016
“There is, however, in art another kind of external similarity which is founded on a fundamental truth. When there is a similarity of inner tendency in the whole moral and spiritual atmosphere, a similarity of ideals, at first closely pursued but later lost to sight, a similarity in the inner feeling of any one period to that of another, the logical result will be a revival of the external forms which served to express those inner feelings in an earlier age.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The life of the spirit may be fairly represented in diagram as a large acute-angled triangle divided horizontally into unequal parts with the narrowest segment uppermost. The lower the segment the greater it is in breadth, depth, and area.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Generally speaking, colour is a power which directly influences the soul. Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammer, the soul is the strings.The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1866 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: V. The psychological working of Colour: Quoted in: Hajo Düchting (2000) Wassily Kandinsky, 1866-1944: A Revolution in Painting. p. 17
“It is never literally true that any form is meaningless and "says nothing." Every form in the world says something. But its message often fails to reach us, and even if it does, full understanding is often withheld from us.] and, properly speaking, FORM IS THE OUTWARD EXPRESSION OF THIS INNER MEANING.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Partly cited in: Raymond Firth (2011) Symbols: Public and Private, p. 43
“The work of art is born of the artist in a mysterious and secret way. From him it gains life and being. Nor is its existence casual and inconsequent, but it has a definite and purposeful strength, alike in its material and spiritual life.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All means are sacred when they are dictated by inner necessity. All means are reprehensible when they do not spring from the fountain of inner necessity... The artist must be blind to 'recognized' and 'unrecognized' form, deaf to the teachings and desires of his time. His open eyes must be directed to his inner life and his ears must be constantly attuned to the voice of inner necessity.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted in: Sunil Goonasekera (1991) George Keyt, Interpretations. p. 146
“At the appointed time, necessities become ripe. That is the time when the Creative Spirit (which one can also designate as the Abstract Spirit) finds an avenue to the soul, later to other souls, and causes a yearning, an inner urge.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Since the form is only an expression of the content and the content is different with different artists, it is then clear that there can be many different forms at the same time which are equally good. Necessity creates the form. Fish which live at great depths have no eyes. The elephant has a trunk. The chameleon changes its color, and so forth.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The first colours which made a strong impression on me were light juice green, white, crimson red, black and yellow ocher. These memories go back to the third year of my life. I saw these colours on various objects [houses and roofs, in Russia] which are not as clear in my mind as the colours themselves.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“..emotion that I experienced on first seeing the fresh paint come out of the tube.. ..the impression of colours strewn over the palette: of colours – alive, waiting, as yet unseen and hidden in their little tubes..”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I thought that the painter had no right to paint so unclearly.. ..(but) the first faint doubt as to the importance of an 'object' as the necessary element in painting.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1895 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Kandinsky is remembering his experience that he saw one of the 'Haystack' paintings of Monet, for the first time in his life, in Moscow (1895)
“If the artist has outer and inner eyes for nature, nature rewards him by giving him inspiration.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“..the long Russian word for creation: 'proisvedenie' - so different from its shorter counterparts in English, French and German - expresses for me the whole history and process of creation, lengthy, mysterious, infinitely complex and foreshadowed by divine predestination.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The destruction of the atom [the split of it, in modern physics] seemed to me to be the same as the destruction of the world.. ..science to me appeared to be dead: its most important basis was only a lunacy, a mistake perpetrated by learned men.. ..who blindly mistook one object for another.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Art is] ..the mysterious expression of the mysterious..”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“At that time [c. 1904 – 1905] I tried, by means of lines and by distribution of mottled points of colours [in his tempera painting on paper: 'Russian Beauty in a Landscape', 1905] to express the musical spirit of Russia. Other pictures of that period reflected the contradictions and later the eccentricities of Russia.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The horse carries the rider with power and speed. But the rider controls the horse. Talent carries the artist to great heights with power and speed. But the artist directs his talent. That is the element of 'consciousness', of 'calculation' in the work – or whatever else one chooses to call it.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“..I let myself go.. [in Kandinsky's Murnau-period when he was painting in open air; c. 1908 – 1914] I thought little of the houses and trees, but applied colour stripes and spots to the canvas with the knife and made them sing out as strongly as I could. Within me sounded the memory of early evening in Moscow, before my eyes was the strong, colour-saturated scale of the Munich light and atmosphere, which thundered deeply in the shadows.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Painting is a thundering conflict of different worlds, which in and out of the battle with one another are intended to create the new world, which is called the world of art. Each work arises technically in a way similar to that in which the cosmos arose – through catastrophes, which from the chaotic roaring of the instruments finally create a symphony, the music of the spheres. The creation of the work is the creation of worlds.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You mention the circle and I agree with your definition.. ..why does the circle fascinates me? It is (1) the most modern form, but asserts itself unconditionally, (2) a precise but inexhaustible variable, (3) simultaneously stable and unstable, (4) simultaneously loud and soft, (5) a single tension that carries countless tensions within it. The circle is the synthesis of the greatest oppositions. It combines the concentric and the eccentric in a single form, and in balance. Of the three primary forms (triangle, square, circle), it points most clearly to the fourth dimension.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1926 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from Kandinsky's letter to Will Grohmann, c. 1926; as cited in Kandinsky, Frank Whitford, Paul Hamlyn Ltd, London 1967, p. 36
“We [ Franz Marc & Kandinsky] thought up the name [ Der Blaue Reiter (Blue Rider)] while sitting at a cafe table.. .Both of us were fond of blue things, [Franz] Marc of blue horses, and I of blue riders. So the title suggested itself.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: as quoted in Wassily Kandinsky: Life and Work, Will Grohmann. H. N. Abrams, 1958 p. 78
“Content is nothing but the sum of organized tensions. From this point of view one can discover the basic identity of the rules of composition in all arts – always accepting that the arts can only represent their object materially by means of organised reactions.. ..already today one can safely assume that the roots of laws of composition are the same for art as they are for nature.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1928 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from: 'Analysis of the Primary Elements of Painting', W. Kandinsky, 1928
“Every phenomenon can be experienced in two ways. These two ways are not arbitrary, but are bound up with the phenomenon – developing out of its nature and characteristics : Externally – or – inwardly.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The geometric point is an invisible thing. Therefore, it must be defined as an incorporeal thing. Considered in terms of substance, it equals zero.. .Thus we look upon the geometric point as the ultimate and most singular union of silence and speech. The geometric point has, therefore, been given its material form, in the first instance, in writing. It belongs to language and signifies silence.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The geometric line is an invisible thing. It is the track made by the moving point; that is, its product. It is created by movement – specifically through the destruction of the intense self-contained repose of the point. Here, the leap out of the static to the dynamic occurs. […] The forces coming from without which transform the point into a line, can be very diverse. The variation in lines depends upon the number of these forces and upon their combinations.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“At the Bauhaus, Klee exuded a healthy, generative atmosphere – as a great artist and as a lucid, pure human being.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1931 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote of Kandinsky, from Bauhaus - Zeitschrift für Gestaltung, no. 3, 1931; as cited in 'Klee & Kandinsky', 2015 exhibition text, Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau Munich, 2015-2016
“Well, we will indeed see how things develop and what will become of our art! In any case, artists should remain apolitical and only think of their work and dedicate all their energies to this work.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1933 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: to Werner Drewes, 10 April 1933; as quoted in 'Klee & Kandinsky', 2015 exhibition text, Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau Munich, 2015-2016
“We do not want to leave Germany forever. Something I would not be able to manage at all, since my roots sit too deep in German soil.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1933 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Wassily Kandinsky to Will Grohmann, 4 Dec. 1933; as quoted in 'Klee & Kandinsky', 2015 exhibition text, Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau Munich, 2015-2016
“An empty canvas is a living wonder - far lovelier than certain pictures.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1937 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted in: Myfanwy Evans Piper (1937) The Painter's Object. p. 53
“I have just finished one painting and am already at work on the preliminary drawings for the next one. I must do something in order to get rid of such habits or I won't manage to find time for any vacation. I have had this new painting in my mind since January, and must get it down on canvas.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1934 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from his letter to Freundlich, 15 July 15, 1938; as cited in Kandinsky in Paris: 1934-1944 - exhibition catalog, published by The Solomon K. Guggenheim Foundation, New York, 1985, p. 27
“Alors sempre avanti! (Ever Forward / Always Ahead)”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1939 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from his letter from Paris to Paul Klee in Switzerland, 12 December 1939; as cited in 'Klee & Kandinsky', 2015 exhibition text, Lenbachhaus und Kunstbau Munich, 2015-2016
“Each spiritual age expresses its special character in a form which corresponds exactly to its character. Each age in this way characterizes its true 'physiognomy', full of expression and strength. Thus in all spiritual areas 'yesterday' is transformed into 'today'. But apart from this, art possesses a further quality which it alone possesses: that quality which enables one to divine the 'tomorrow' today – a strength which is both creative and prophetic.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1942 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Kandinsky's last theoretical statement (Paris, 1942); in Kandinsky, Frank Whitford, Paul Hamlyn Ltd, London 1967, p. 38
“Paris [1933 - 1944] with its wonderful (intense soft) light had relaxed my palette — there were other colors, other entirely new forms, and some that I had used years earlier. Naturally I did all this unconsciously.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) first seen 1944 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quote from his letter to Alfred Barr, Jr., 16 July, 1944; as cited in Vivian Endicott Barnett, et al., 'Kandinsky', exh. cat. [New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 2009], p. 70
“Houses and trees [in and around Murnau] made hardly any impression on my thoughts. I used the palette knife to spread lines and splashes of paint on the canvas, and made them sing as loud as I could. That fateful hour in Moscow [when he saw a colorful Haystack painting of Monet for the first time in his life] rang in my ears, my eyes were filled with the strong saturated colours of the light and air of Munich, and the deep thunder of its shadows.”
Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: as quoted by , in Expressionism; Praeger Publishers, New York, 1973, p. 109