Vassily Kandinsky

After ‘Cezanne, the Master of Provence’, The Carrières des Lumières is presenting a production lasting around ten minutes, created from works executed by the prolife and visionary artist, Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944). A painter, poet, art theorist, and founder of abstract art, Kandinsky revolutionised the history of art with his many compositions, which are now exhibited around the world.

Like Cezanne, he came to art relatively late, at the age of thirty. He was born in Moscow, and after studying law, he travelled around Europe and discovered the work of the avant-garde artists, such as Cezanne, Monet, and Matisse. Kandinsky also painted the Mont Sainte-Victoire in his own fashion. His study of the symbolism of colour and forms echoed Cezanne’s own studies: both artists contested objective perception, focusing instead on the painter’s interiority, the very essence of creativity.

‘Wassily Kandinsky, the Odyssey of Abstraction’ focuses on Kandinsky’s spiritual quest, via the major artistic phases of his life, from Moscow to Paris. The immersive exhibition is composed of two distinct parts: his figurative work and the advent of abstraction. The first part evokes the artist’s early figurative work, influenced by Impressionism, oneiric Fauvism, and, to some extent, pointillism. You are initially plunged into Kandinsky’s memories, Russian folklore, and the country’s legendary capital.

The second part is more experimental, highlighting the force of movement and the rhythm of forms and colour. Immersed in a chromatic explosion, you will discover the most significant works of this modernist impetus—Composition VIII (1923) and Yellow-Red-Blue (1925)—up to the biomorphic works of his last years. Becoming closer to music, painting gradually shifted away from representational constraints and no longer used the real world as a reference but the inner self instead.

A veritable invitation to explore Kandinsky’s inner cosmos, the immersive exhibition disorientates you and eventually attains an abstract and liberated osmosis.

Listen to the playlist of the exhibition