Kandinsky, a poem in four decades – The Economist

The exhibition can be seen in CentroCentro in Madrid.

“Schwarzer Raster”, by 1922 present extensive retrospective in Spain. photo: CentroCentro

Four decades of artistic evolution of Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944), one of the pioneers of abstract art, present in the sample Kandinsky, a retrospective in CentroCentro, in the emblematic building of the City of Madrid, facing the Cibeles.

The exhibition presents works from the early figurative and exuberant experimentation of abstraction and color of Russian painter it can be seen until February 28 next year.

Produced and organized by CentroCentro, the Pompidou Centre in Paris and Arthemisia Group, the exhibition, curated by the art historian Angela Lampe, curator of the National Museum Modern Art Centre Pompidou shown almost 150 years since the birth of the painter.

The exhibition is conceived as a monographic retrospective featuring some 100 paintings, drawings and photographs taken from the rich holdings of the Centre Pompidou .

Almost all of these extraordinary works were part of the artist’s personal collection and were donated by his widow, Nina.

The exhibition was shown in 2014 at the Palazzo Reale Milan, where more than 200,000 visitors enjoyed before traveling to Milwaukee and Nashville, United States.

Deeply impressed by the series of haystacks Monet Impressionist exhibition in Moscow in 1896 and commissioning staging of Lohengrin, the opera of Wagner, Kandinsky abandoned a university degree in law and economics to become a painter in Germany, at age 30.

In addition to the classic itinerary of studies under the direction of teachers and Anton Azbé and Franz von Stuck in Munich, traveled in Europe (even Tunisia 1904-1905) and remained in Sevres, near Paris, from 1906 to 1907 (Parc de Saint-Cloud, 1906).

He developed an artistic vision that encompassed many fields, such as painting and music, through which he sought and promoted what he described as “the spiritual in art” in the essay of the same name, written between 1904 and 1911 to structure their ideas.

The exhibition is chronologically in four sections over eight rooms.

These sections of the exhibition follow the footsteps of the periods Key in Kandinsky’s life, from early years in Germany and Russia to return to the Bauhaus in Weimar, until recently in France.

This, through a series of major works as “Old Town” (1902), “Song” (1906), “Improvisation III” (1909), “In Gray” (1919), “Yellow, Red and Blue” (1925) and “Blue Sky” (1940) .

Three countries, three sensibilities

The exhibition curator, Angela Lampe said there are not many artists and, indeed, few people who have lived in three different countries.

Among the many biographies of exiled of the vanguard, the Kandinsky holds a special place. Russian-born German admired as late as the Bauhaus and French in 1944

Although the issuance of a new passport was mainly due to administrative issues, these data show where they came from artistic influences of Kandinsky, and not just during the time he lived in these countries, but since its inception.

In his autobiographical Rückblicke (“Looking Back”), described in 1913 Kandinsky three revealing artistic experiences related to each of these countries.

Even during his student days, a study trip character ethnographic city of Vologda made a strong impression on the young Russian.

Kandinsky was fascinated by the rustic rooms decorated in a traditional way. Upon entering the brightly colored rooms, believed to be in a box.

In particular, in these years Kandinsky was moved by the opera Lohengrin, of Wagner.

These three experiences The Russian folk art, modern French painting and German opera, were complementary and mutually benefiting. Form the foundation of the work of Kandinsky.