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We're at the Solomon[br]R. Guggenheim Museum

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in New York City.

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We're looking at a painting[br]by Wassily Kandinsky.

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This is Improvisation[br]28 (Second Version.)

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It's interesting to start off[br]by thinking about that title

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because it's not the[br]title of something that's

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being represented.

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It's the kind of notation[br]that a composer uses.

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Right.

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Normally in art history[br]we have paintings

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with titles of stories[br]from the Bible,

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or from history, or from[br]mythology, or landscapes

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that have the name of a place.

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But here we have[br]improvisation which

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is the name of a kind[br]of musical composition.

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So the immediate question is,[br]why is Kandinsky doing that?

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Well, because he's[br]composing here.

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He's composing with[br]form but this is still

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rooted in the[br]stories of the Bible

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and of his particular[br]historical moment.

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But he's clearly trying to[br]associate painting with music

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to suggest that, like[br]music, painting can signify.

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It can mean things.

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It can take us places without[br]representing anything concrete.

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Actually, he would[br]go further than that

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and say that you[br]could hear color,

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that you could see music.

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This idea, which is[br]called synesthesia,

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is something that Kandinsky[br]was very interested in.

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The idea that there could be a[br]kind of crossing of the senses.

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So, looking at this,[br]he may have wanted

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us to actually hear something.

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And, in fact, we know that[br]Kandinsky was very influenced

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by Arnold Schoenberg, a[br]turn-of-the-century composer

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who was jettisoning the familiar[br]Western harmonies to create

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a new kind of difficult,[br]atonal music for the beginning

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of the 20th century.

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And I see something atonal, I[br]see something difficult here.

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What would this[br]painting sound like?

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For me, it would sound[br]like a cacophony.

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It would sound like chaos.

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It would sound like a very[br]dangerous, but also brilliant,

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moment.

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We have brilliant color,[br]a kind of hazy atmosphere

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through which that[br]color pops, we

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have these black[br]diagonal lines that

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crisscross with each other that[br]almost feel like weapons moving

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through space.

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And it's appropriate that the[br]analogy that you're drawing

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is one of war.

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This is 1912.

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It's just two years before[br]the First World War begins.

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And early 20th-century[br]Russian history

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is filled with political chaos.

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We're clearly on the[br]verge of abstraction.

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And, in fact, when we first[br]look at this painting,

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it looks entirely abstract.

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That is, we don't[br]immediately recognize

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the things of the world.

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But this isn't[br]what we would call

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a completely abstract painting.

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Right.

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So one might not call this[br]painting an abstract painting

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but call it an[br]abstracted painting.

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So, therefore, we[br]should still be

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able to recognize some[br]elements of the natural world.

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Kandinsky was concerned that[br]if we could recognize things

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too clearly that our conscious[br]minds would take over

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the interpretation and we would[br]close off our emotional ability

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to respond to the[br]pure color and form.

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In the upper right, I[br]seem to see a mountain

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with some buildings on it.

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Maybe with chimney stacks or,[br]perhaps, a church on a hill.

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An ideal city, a kind[br]of heavenly Jerusalem.

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Kandinsky was deeply[br]influenced by biblical imagery.

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And so, even though this is a[br]tremendously modern painting,

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it is still rooted in[br]this ancient tradition

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of representing[br]Christian stories.

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So it makes sense that[br]we have a battle field.

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Forces at war.

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In fact, art historians have[br]looked at these paintings

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as a kind of representation[br]of an apocalypse,

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of a moment when the[br]sins of the world

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are going to be washed away.

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In the lower left, you[br]have a great flood,

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you have a wave, this idea[br]of the way in which God

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in the Old Testament had[br]wiped man from the earth,

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except for Noah and his family.

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Just above that wave,[br]cannon are being fired.

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The atmospheric effect[br]almost reads like the smoke

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on a battlefield.

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Down at the bottom,[br]art historians

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sometimes recognize[br]the manes and the arcs

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of the necks of horses.

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And we know that[br]Kandinsky was really

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interested throughout his[br]career in the idea of the horse

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and rider.

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Symbolizing a number[br]of different things,

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having overlapping[br]meanings, referencing

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the four horsemen[br]of the apocalypse

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but also the idea of redemption.

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This was also utopian.

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The idea that we could wash[br]away the old world, a world that

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was about to be destroyed, not[br]only by the Russian Revolution,

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but also by the First World War.

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Kandinsky, at this[br]moment, was convinced

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that he could help lead that,[br]at least in the visual realm.

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Many artists at this time[br]in the early 20th century

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had a sense that the artist[br]could play an important role

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in the new civilization[br]that was going

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to emerge in the 20th century.

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So here we have a[br]painting that is using

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color in a radically new way.

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This is color for its own sake.

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Not to mimic, not to describe.

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We have line that is being[br]used for its own sake.

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Lines that are abstractly[br]moving across the surface

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to create a sense of rhythm,[br]to create a sense of staccato.

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Musicality in this painting[br]it is absolutely new.

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