MORE FAVORITE WESTERN PAINTINGS
The Nostalgia of the Infinite (c.
1912-13) by Giorgio de Chirico
Summer Evening (1947) by Edward
Hopper
Three Stars (1942) by Wassily
Kandinsky
Giorgio
de Chirico is my favorite Surrealist painter. His unconventional palette, creamy,
ceramic hues, and skilled draughtsmanship combine together to depict desolate, dreamlike
scenes. Empty streets, wandering, isolated figures, unsettlingly dormant
mannequins, assorted weird objects, juxtaposed, are his stock-in-trade.
“The
Nostalgia of the Infinite” (c. 1912-13) is a de Chirico classic. It is a
picture of desolation.
We
could say that desolation is a fundamental human condition. Although human
beings are social creatures, they exist as separate beings, not ontologically merged.
Absent meaningful relationships, the human being is existentially solitary, a
point bespoken by the psychopaths in our midst.
In
this dreamscape the tower is forbidding. The motif recalls the Tower of Babel,
a symbol of sinful pride and its consequences—confusion, discord, division, and
finally, dispersal. “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its
top in the sky and so make a name for ourselves” (Genesis 11:4). Whatever the
tower might stand for here—there are different takes on it—the motif evokes apprehension,
sitting in the center of ominously barren environs.
The
Museum of Modern Art dates the piece to 1912-13 and attributes the 1911 date to
a probable memory lapse on the part of de Chirico when he inscribed it in the
painting years later.
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| The Nostalgia of the Infinite (c. 1912-13) by Giorgio de Chirico |
Another
painter of desolation is Edward Hopper. Beginning under the influence of Édouard
Manet, he developed his own style over time.
Hopper’s
signature oeuvre is to show single individuals in an urban setting, or scenes
altogether empty of people. When two or three individuals appear in the
painting, they are somewhat detached and relate to each other distantly.
“Summer
Evening” (1947) is typical. It is a subdued statement about isolated
individuals in American society—the young man and woman are conversing, after
all.
The picture brings to life memorably warm, ambient summer evenings in the American suburbs, in this case somewhere in Connecticut or New York, most likely. Contemplating the painting, we swim in the suffusing humidity of the dimly lit incandescent porch.
The picture brings to life memorably warm, ambient summer evenings in the American suburbs, in this case somewhere in Connecticut or New York, most likely. Contemplating the painting, we swim in the suffusing humidity of the dimly lit incandescent porch.
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| Summer Evening (1947) by Edward Hopper |
Wassily
Kandinsky in his philosophy of art understood music as the expression of the inner
spirituality of the artist. He believed that painting played the same role as
music in achieving this goal of spiritual expression, but painting was secondary
in efficacy, the deficient analogue of music, as it were.
A
website devoted to Kandinsky quotes him: “A painter, who finds no satisfaction in
mere representation, however artistic, in his longing to express his inner
life, cannot but envy the ease with which music, the most non-material of the
arts today, achieves this end. He naturally seeks to apply the methods of music
to his own art.”
—“Quotes,” Kandinsky
In
Concerning the Spiritual in Art
(1911), Kandinsky wrote, “Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammers, the
soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand which plays,
touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul.”
Throughout
most of his career, Kandinsky sought to represent in abstract painting the analogue
of music. At this task he was successful and a pioneer besides.
Kandinsky
with good reason is honored as the first Abstract Expressionist. Although the
term “Abstract Expressionism” is applied principally to the movement in the
U.S. beginning in the 1940s, the term was first used by Alfred Barr to describe
Kandinsky in 1929.
There
are varieties of Abstract Expressionism, and Kandinsky’s late oeuvre, which
sits halfway between the lurid emotionalism of Die Brücke and the dry geometric
compositions of Suprematism, is the type I would consider most appealing.
Kandinsky’s
early paintings, which recall the loud, delirious images of German
Expressionism, are roughly executed.
While
I can appreciate the historical significance of a Willem de Kooning, who, I am
aware, currently holds the world record for the most expensive modern painting
ever sold—$300 million in September 2015—I still can’t shake off the thought
that whenever de Kooning would paint he’d use the sole of his foot (in my imagination, hey, not literally).
It
is for this reason that I prefer Kandinsky’s late style of Abstract
Expressionism—tidy, not raggedy—which, by the way, he maintained until he
passed away in 1944.
Three Stars (1942) illustrates
what I consider the best of Kandinsky—inventive, highly expressive, biomorphic…curious,
eccentric, deliciously colored…winning, and, memorably, exactly what Kandinsky
sought to achieve—musical.
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| Three Stars (1942) by Wassily Kandinsky |
Some
amazing animated tributes to Kandinsky’s legacy are available on YouTube.
Examples:
“Wassily
Kandinsky Animation”
“Wassily
Kandinsky – The Creator”
“Kandinsky
Composition VIII”
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Gonzalinho