Kandinsky Quotes

With cold eyes and indifferent mind the spectators regard the work. Connoissers admire the "skill" (as one admires a tightrope walker), enjoy the "quality of painting" (as one enjoys a pasty). But hungry souls go hungry away. The vulgar herd stroll through the rooms and pronounce the pictures "nice" or "splendid." Those who could speak have said nothing, those who could hear have heard nothing. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

He knew Kandinsky by heart: every trickle of red, slash of black ink, and hemorrhage of gold. Each dissonant note in its allegro, the harmony in its adagio, and its deep blue intermezzo, formed a symphony he had memorized in his body. He couldn't say if Fragment 2 symbolized the Deluge, the Last Judgment, or the Resurrection. But it had become his religion, offering both redemption and pain.. ~ Kelly Oliver

I value those artists who embody the expression of their life. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Doubts must be resolved alone within the soul. Otherwise one would profane one's own powerful solution. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

To those that are not accustomed to it the inner beauty appears as ugliness because humanity in general inclines to the outer and knows nothing of the inner. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

That is beautiful which is produced by the inner need, which springs from the soul. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

I had to find a way to paint abstractly, which is what I wanted to do. I couldn't forget [Wassily] Kandinsky and [Kazimir] Malevich and [Piet] Mondrian, I mean that was the basis. ~ Frank Stella

Only just now awakening after years of materialism, our soul is still infected with the despair born of unbelief, of lack of purpose and aim. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

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

How can German music not be represented by an article? ~ Wassily Kandinsky

I applied streaks and blobs of colors onto the canvas with a palette knife, and I made them sing with all the intensity I could ... ~ Wassily Kandinsky

I think Kandinsky and I were very near friends. ~ Josef Albers

Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the harmonies, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul. ~ Wassilly Kandinsky

Color directly influences the soul. Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammers, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another purposively, to cause vibrations in the soul. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The nightmare of materialism, which has turned the life of the universe into an evil, useless game, is not yet past; it holds the awakening soul still in its grip. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Every man who steeps himself in the spiritual possibilities of his heart is a valuable helper in the building of the spiritual pyramid which will someday reach to heaven. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Orange is red brought nearer to humanity by yellow. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The organic laws of construction tangled me in my desires, and only with great pain, effort, and struggle did I break through these 'walls around art. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

My eyes roved over the walls covered with my collages and prints of famous paintings. Magritte, Kandinsky, Kahlo. My origami shapes hung from fishing wire, dangling over my bed. They shivered in the slight breeze blowing through my open window. It was my own little escape pod, but none of it was enough tonight. ~ Heather Demetrios

The artist is the hand that, by touching this or that key, sets the soul vibrating automatically. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

I really believe that I am the first and only artist to throw not just the 'subject' out of my paintings, but every 'object' as well. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The artist must be blind to distinction between 'recognized' or 'unrecognized' conventions of form, deaf to the transitory teaching and demands of his particular age. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Each period of a civilisation creates an art that is specific in it and which we will never see reborn. To try and revive the principles of art of past centuries can lead only to the production of stillborn works. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

You get Kandinsky, a bad mother, all them pick-up-sticks pictures ... ~ Donald Barthelme

In every painting a whole is mysteriously enclosed, a whole life of tortures, doubts, of hours of enthusiasm and inspiration. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

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

Our epoch is a time of tragic collision between matter and spirit and of the downfall of the purely material world view. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

What would it take to make you intervene ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The arts are encroaching one upon another, and from a proper use of this encroachment will rise the art that is truly monumental. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The force that propels the human spirit on the clear way forward and upward is the abstract spirit. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

A painter, who finds no satisfaction in mere representation, however artistic, in his longing to express his inner life, cannot but envy the ease with which music, the most non-material of the arts today, achieves this end. He naturally seeks to apply the methods of music to his own art. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The artist is not born to a life of pleasure. He must not live idle; he has a hard work to perform, and one which often proves a cross to be borne. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

All methods are sacred if they are internally necessary. All methods are sins if they are not justified by internal necessity. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Black is like the silence of the body after death, the close of life. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The circle is the synthesis of the greatest oppositions. It combines the concentric and the eccentric in a single form and in equilibrium. Of the three primary forms, it points most clearly to the fourth dimension. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

As a picture painted in yellow always radiates spiritual warmth, or as one in blue has apparently a cooling effect, so green is only boring. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Drawing instruction is a training towards perception, exact observation and exact presentation not of the outward appearances of an object, but of its constructive elements, its lawful forces-tensions, which can be discovered in given objects and of the logical structures of same-education toward clear observation and clear rendering of the contexts, whereby surface phenomena are an introductory step towards the three-dimensional. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Somebody can paint with a fine brush like Monet and do millions of little dots or somebody can splatter it up there like Kandinsky or Jackson Pollock and go "Yep, that's art." That's okay. ~ Patrick Wilson

A world of colors on the palette remaining ... wandering ... on canvases still emerging. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Generally speaking, color directly influences the soul. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The more abstract is form, the more clear and direct its appeal. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Music is the ultimate teacher. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The word compositon moved me spiritually and I made it my aim in life to paint a composition. It affected me like a prayer and filled me with awe. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Almost without exception, blue refers to the domain of abstraction and immateriality. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

(...) an inner feeling called "Stimmung" by the germans and best translated as sentiment (it is to be regreted that this word, sentiment, which is meant to describe the poetical efforts of an artist living soul, has been misused and finally, ridiculed. Was there ever a great word that the masses did not try immediatly to cheapen and desecrate?) (...) ~ Wassily Kandinsky

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

The deeper the blue becomes, the more strongly it calls man towards the infinite, awakening in him a desire for the pure and, finally, for the supernatural ... The brighter it becomes, the more it loses its sound, until it turns into silent stillness and becomes white. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The eyes are hammers. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Of all the arts, abstract painting is the most difficult. It demands that you know how to draw well, that you have a heightened sensitivity for composition and for colors, and that you be a true poet. This last is essential. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Absolute green is the most restful color, lacking any undertone of joy, grief, or passion. On exhausted men this restfulness has a beneficial effect, but after a time it becomes tedious. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

In their pursuit of the same supreme end, Matisse and Picasso stand side by side, Matisse representing color and Picasso form. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

There is no must in art because art is free. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Color transmits and translates emotion. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

The composition is the organized sum of the interior functions of every part of the work. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

In place of an intensive cooperation among artists, there is a battle for goods. Hatred, partisanship, cliques, jealousy, and intrigues are the natural consequences of an aimless, materialist art. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

It is essential that the painter should develop not only his eyes, but also his soul, so that it too may be capable of weighing colors in balance ... ~ Wassily Kandinsky

There is only one road to follow, that of analysis of the basic elements in order to arrive ultimately at an adequate graphic expression. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

I let myself go. I thought little of the houses and trees, but applied colour stripes and spots to the canvas ... 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

The world is full of resonances. It constitutes a cosmos of things exerting a spiritual action. The dead matter is a living spirit. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

There was an exhibition in Munich in 1937, 'Degenerate Art,' which included work by Klee, Kandinsky, Beckmann and many others. The work was called 'sick' and put in the trash heap. The sentiments expressed toward contemporary art by Jesse Helms, Pat Robertson and Mayor Giuliani recall the language used by the Nazis. ~ Hans Haacke

The spirit, like the body, can be strengthened and developed by frequent exercise. Just as the body, if neglected, grows weaker and finally impotent, so the spirit perishes if untended. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Painting took on a fabulous strength and splendor; the object was discredited as an indispensable element of the picture. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Form itself, even if completely abstract ... has its own inner sound. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Color cannot stand alone. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Color is the keyboard. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano, with its many strings. ~ Wassily Kandinsky

Efforts to revive the art principles of the past at best produce works of art that resemble a stillborn child. ~ Wassily Kandinsky