Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) made Farbstudie – Quadrate mit konzentrischen Ringen (Colour Study — Squares with Concentric Rings) in 1913, at a moment of decisive transition in his work. He had recently completed Über das Geistige in der Kunst (Concerning the Spiritual in Art), the theoretical text in which he argued that colour and form could act directly on the viewer's emotions, without the mediation of representational subject matter. The concentric rings study was not a finished painting but an investigation: a grid of squares each containing a target of coloured rings in different combinations, systematically exploring how colours affect one another when placed in proximity. It is simultaneously a scientific document and an object of remarkable visual intensity.
The work is now held at the Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus in Munich, which holds the largest collection of Kandinsky's early work. By 1913 Kandinsky was already producing his first fully abstract compositions — the Improvisations and Compositions — and the colour studies of this period were the systematic groundwork for that leap. Each ring in the study carries what Kandinsky believed was an intrinsic emotional charge; the relationships between them were as carefully considered as the intervals in a musical score.
Fine Porcelain — 10 oz. Dishwasher and microwave safe.
Wassily Kandinsky, Farbstudie – Quadrate mit konzentrischen Ringen, 1913. Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich. Public domain.
