Seeing the invisible - exhibition of artworks
Seeing the invisible - exhibition of artworks by Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky.
On the occasion of established artist Piet Mondrian’s 150th birthday as well as the 110th debut anniversary of Der Blaue Reiter, the VCCA organizes a display, introducing many famous artworks in the format from three classical artists following the abstract movement: Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky, with the topic ‘Seeing the invisible’
Piet Mondrian (1872 - 1944), a Dutch artist known for abstract art, has experimented with many styles such as impressionism, pointillism and cubism until forming many abstract artworks containing minimalist shapes. Having co-founded the De Stijl (meaning ‘style’ in Dutch), Mondrian has expanded the rules of abstractionism and simplification through painting and sculptures as well as architecture, graphics and industrial design. From the Netherlands to America, and across the world, Piet Mondrian is known for his signature straight lines and the minimalist colors red, yellow and black. In this exhibition, the viewer will be able to admire the change from pointillism in ‘Lighthouse in Westkapelle’ (1909-1910) to the experiments with composition in the 1910s and finally the most prolific artwork with ‘composition 2 with blue red and yellow’ or the ‘New York City’ series in the 1940s.
Parallel with the neoplasticism - like how Mondrian described his artworks in the Netherlands, Wassily Kandinsky ( Russian Artist, 1866 - 1944) and Paul Klee have many similarities with the changes from impressionism, cubism and surrealism to abstractionism. In 1911, Kandinsky founded the group Der Blaue Reite (The Blue Rider) and officially came out with their first release in 1912, from there, they got more members, such as Paul Klee, becoming two of the few artists who laid the foundation for abstract art. If Paul Klee, who taught about ‘Systems of Composition and the theory of design’ (Schriosystem zur Form und Gestaltungslehre), published in english with the name Paul Klee Notebooks, is seen as important to the world of modern art, then ‘On the spiritual in Art’ by Kandinsky, published in december of 1911 and to this day is still regarded as an important work on the theory and philosophy of art. While works by Paul Klee can be easily recognized by the blocks of color like in ‘Fish Magic’ (1925), ‘castle and the sun’ (1927), ‘main street and the pavement’ (1929), Wassily Kandinsky attracts the viewer with fast, introspective, sometimes light and passionate while others overwhelming and menacing shapes and colors, paintings such as ‘composition 7’ (1913), ‘painting with a red dot’ (1914) or ‘Celebration tones’ (1923) and ‘ blue sky’ (1940).
Taking inspiration from the book ‘seeing the invisible’ by famous French philosopher Michel Henry about the artworks by Wassily Kandinsky, the exhibition ‘seeing the invisible’ this time features nearly 80 artworks in the form of images and videos projected by devices will bring a new form of interaction and experience to the viewer for abstract art.
