Kandinsky - Concerning Spirituality in Art

Introduction Overview

Kandinsky firstly establishes that each art has its own time and place, and its authenticity cannot be restored in any manner. Such efforts to reproduce a work, style or method of art practice would only be artificial and imitation. He describes the thoughts, feelings and lifestyles in any particular time can never be replicated and as such, the art that is produced from this time can never be true as to have the same intent. Kandinsky places an importance on the inner feelings driving the art period, and goes on to make an exception to the above.

A revival of the external situations which fostered the inner feelings of the former time can be achieved through a similarity of ‘inner tendency in the whole moral and spiritual atmosphere,’ of the ideals and response, and as such, the reproductions of a former period and thus current. While seeming to be a contradiction, it somehow draws a parallel.

Kandinsky quotes Schumann and Tolstoi’s opposing views on the underlying purpose of the artist - as enlightener and inspirer or merely practicer. There, forms a great tension between the materialistic nature of the world today and the indifference of the heart and soul of a man. He denounces ‘art for art’s sake as a ‘squandering of artistic power,’ as aimless and materialistic. Kandinsky believes that the artist should look toward the higher ideals and engage in the inner feeling, as the spiritual life to which art belongs, transcends the fluctuations of the ‘moment’ and proves to influence and create a ‘deep and powerful prophetic strength.’

Kandinsky implies that the materialistic side of the art world produces the more inhumane natures of man, and divides society and indeed the art world, into those who appreciate only the external beauty and those who strive further for the inner thought. Both forms of art are consequently derived from the present as all art takes into account the feelings of its own time and place. But the art which creates further movement of thought and aims for spiritual inner thought and purpose stands constant.