Point and Line to Plane (Dover Fine Art, History of Art)

The renowned artist, famous for his abstract works, seemingly developed his own language in art and fortunately he describes this language in his second book "Point and Line to Plane". Being written in 1926, 16 years after his first revolutionary work which is even shorter and thereby a must read "Concerning the Spiritual in Art" this seems to be a continuation of his to describe how his art changes after his Munich period and he undeniably succeeds in this attempt. We see that "Concerning the Spiritual in Art" detailed the value of Color and Form and we can see both valuable facets deeply explored mainly with his 1911-1913 works. This book manages to go into even further detail with form, exploring the importance of the relationship between points and lines on a plane. It is somewhat more categorical and scientific even by organizing everything into small paragraphs in almost a code like way. We can see this idea of point and line being expressed by some of his later works. All in all, an enlightening read that makes an otherwise unintelligible style of painting understandable.

Unlike 'Concerning the Spiritual in Art', which is a beautifully written account of a personal artistic philosophy, we find in 'Point and Line to Plane' Kandinsky adopting a psuedo-scientific method, in a step by step guide, to establish and prove the main tenet of his practice, that there is a correlation between painting and music. It is very hard to follow, and requires experimentation alongside in paint to gain anything from it.

I've been reseraching Paul Klee and in doing so, it is impossible not to look at WK. To keep this short, none of the developments that happened in visual art happened in total isolation; as always there are influences. Understanding the thinking behind the point, line and plane is fundamental to decyphering a lot of more abstract work particularly from the 1950s onwards (Geoffrey Clarke for example).Easy read, lots of fundamental "truths" to get to grips with and if you too are looking for the altrnative to representational or figurative art, this is a great place to start.

interesting for reading

Although written 100 years ago, there is much here to interest the serious artist. Kandinsky was explaining the groundbreaking work done by artists of that time and making Abstract Art accessible. What he has to say about Art is as relevant today as it was then. A seminal work.

Wonderful book.

Happy with book, its condition and the delivery. There were no problems. Cheers!

great book