Minneapolis Institute of Art

Study for Improvisation V

Vassily Kandinsky

Date

1910

Medium

Oil on pulp board

Department

European Art

Institution

Minneapolis Institute of Art

This landscape evokes Biblical stories of the Apocalypse, which foretold Christ's second coming. In the foreground, a woman in blue kneels before a tall figure with streaming golden hair, possibly Christ, while in the background two horsemen of the Apocalypse vault a fence. As a pioneer of abstract painting, Vassily Kandinsky thought art could make inner truths visible. An improvisation, he said, was a largely unconscious, spontaneous expression of inner character, or non-material (i.e., spiritual) nature. Kandinsky wanted painting to function like music, using colors and forms like melodies and rhythms—abstractly—to summon emotion. Frame: Gift of Galerie Thomas, Munich, Germany. Europe

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