Abstract
Psychophysical considerations enter into the understanding of a work of art. The evolution of a psychophysical approach, which dates to the second half of nineteenth century at least, has moreover played a role in the flowering of the abstract movement at the beginning of the following century. The analysis of a painting by Wassily Kandinsky highlights some aesthetic and semiotic issues concerning perception. Bordering on iconicity, this painting makes it possible to grasp how abstraction, more than simply transcending protrayal, formed an organic concept of the field of perception. This concept was integrated into the thought, work and historical context of this artist, and the intensification of its dynamics and perceptive effects bears witness to their profound contribution to the meaning of the painting.
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Notes
- 1.
The original French version of this paper, presented at the Congress of the International Association for Visual Semiotics held in Quebec City in 2001, has been published in the academic journal Visio (Caliandro 2004).
- 2.
Here is the original excerpt in German:
Der Ausdruck “Abstrakte Kunst” ist nicht beliebt. Und das mit Recht, da er wenig sagend ist, oder mindestens verwirrend wirkt. Deshalb versuchten die Pariser abstrakten Maler und Bildhauer einen neuen Ausdruck zu schaffen: sie sagen “art nonfiguratif”.
Gleichbedeutend mit dem deutschen Ausdruck “gegenstandslose Kunst”. Die Negationsteile dieser Worte (“non” und “los” ) sind nicht geschickt: sie streichen den “Gegenstand” und stellen nichts an seine Stelle. Schon seit längerer Zeit versuchte man (was auch ich noch vor dem Krieg tat) das “abstrakt” durch “absolut” zu ersetzen. Eigentlich kaum besser. Der beste Name wäre meiner Meinung nach “reale Kunst”, da diese Kunst neben die äußere Welt eine neue Kunstwelt stellt, geistiger Natur. Eine Welt, die ausschließlich durch Kunst entstehen kann. Eine reale Welt. Die alte Bezeichnung “abstrakte Kunst” hat sich aber bereits eingebürgert.
- 3.
Cf. for instance Kandinsky (1926, French transl.: pp. 41–42, 66, 101–102 and 135–136).
- 4.
Let’s think of Malevich’s suprematism, Mondrian’s theosophical values, or Kandinsky’s essay, one of his first, which is precisely entitled Über das Geistige in der Kunst, insbesondere in der Malerei (Concerning the Spiritual in Art: Especially in Painting, published at the end of 1911 and dated 1912).
- 5.
Critics are not unanimous on the exact moment of this move: the 1910 watercolour that some supposed to be his first abstract work has been dated by Kandinsky much later; so, others prefer to indicate as reliable the following year, when the artist realises the abstract oil Bild mit Kreis (Picture with a circle, 1911).
- 6.
An exhibition in Rome—from 7 October 2000 to 4 February 2001—tried to fill this gap. Cf. Comerlati (ed.) (2000).
- 7.
A three-month stay in Sweden (December 1915 to March 1916) is also included in this period.
- 8.
Cf. Derouet in: Derouet and Boissel (eds.) (1984, p. 145).
- 9.
According to Nina Kandinsky’s recollection, he was not allowed to hold the office of president of the Russian Academy of Artistic Sciences because he was not registered with the party.
- 10.
According to the catalogue of the Centre Pompidou, this study, inv. 336, dated on the back by Nina Kandinsky, bears in the lower left the inscription “Zubovskaya Square” in Russian; cf. Derouet and Boisse (eds.) (1984, p. 161). The artist painted several versions of this view (see Moscow, Zubovskaya Square III, circa 1916).
- 11.
Cf. ibid., pp. 148–149, for details on this placement as head of household and to appreciate the personal investment Kandinsky made in it beyond the emotional upheaval he experienced at that time (in March 1916 he definitively separated from Gabriele Münter and one year later, in February 1917, he met his new wife Nina; cf. ibid., pp. 146 and 150).
- 12.
Not only did Kandinsky have to abandon the project of building a villa for himself, but in 1917, in a campaign of expropriation following the October Revolution, the artist, no longer able to meet his mortgage obligations, sold his building and finally lost everything he had acquired. Kandinsky will mention several times the difficulties and hardships of these years in Moscow. Cf. ibid., p. 148.
- 13.
This book, originally published with the title Rückblicke in Munich and Berlin in 1913, was revised and refined in detail by the artist himself for the Russian edition in 1918. An early partial translation into English was published by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation with the title “Retrospects by Wassily Kandinsky” in 1945, upon the occasion of the Kandinsky memorial exhibition in New York.
- 14.
In the Russian edition Kandinsky substitutes with: “the Cathedral of the Assumption and the Church of Vasily’s the Blessed”.
- 15.
In the Russian edition: “move”.
- 16.
The catalogue of the Centre Pompidou compares this undated work, inv. 345, with the painting, not located, In front of the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin in Moscow, circa 1903–1904.
- 17.
One, a lead pencil drawing, the other made with lead and coloured pencils, these studies are part of the research for the realisation of Moscow I.
- 18.
As Nina Kandinsky pointed out, the young Rodchenko used to work in the “studio for art reproduction, a kind of graphic studio” that Wassily Kandinsky had installed on the sixth and last floor of his building near the Zubovskaya Square (Derouet and Boissel (eds.) 1984, p. 148, own translation). It is especially in photography that Rodchenko will then explore the effects of bold perspectives.
- 19.
In Moscow II, Kandinsky seems to shift away from this perspectival depth to focus more on plastic plane and the possible effects of optical depth generated by colour.
- 20.
Already in Der Blaue Reiter Wassily Kandinsky stressed the value of form as a means of expressing inner resonance (“Ausdrucksmittel des inneren Klanges”). Kandinsky, “Über die Formfrage”, in: Kandinsky and Marc (eds.) (1911, new edition: pp. 74–100, esp. 76).
- 21.
Fechner briefly outlined what he called the “psychophysical basic law” in his Zend-Avesta, published in 1851, and further elaborated on his findings in Elemente der Psychophysik (Elements of psychophysics, 1860). Ellenberger (1970, p. 218).
- 22.
Konrad Fiedler argued in 1887 that it was impossible to distinguish psychic and physical processes as regards what he called the expression of form (cf. Fiedler 1887, French transl.: p. 73–74). In 1893, the sculptor and theorist Adolf von Hildebrand also expressed in terms of sympathy, activation of the direct feeling of the body, effects and appearance of form (cf. Hildebrand 1893, French transl.: pp. 117–145, esp. 137–138 and 122–126).
- 23.
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Caliandro, S. (2019). Moscow I by Wassili Kandinsky (or, The Psychophysics of Perception in Art). In: Morphodynamics in Aesthetics. Lecture Notes in Morphogenesis. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29631-5_6
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