1. Abstractionism
Brian Kingsley & Olivia Lewis

2. What is abstract art?
•Abstract art uses color, •Abstraction means to
lines, and shapes to create a withdraw part of something
visual language in order to consider it
separately.
•It does not necessarily have
to represent real world •The artist can start with a
things real world object and
abstract elements from it,
•Abstract art can deviate
arriving at a more or less
from reality slightly,
simplified form of the object
partially, or fully

3. Influences on Abstractionism
•Primarily influenced by Fauvism
and Cubism of the early 20th
century
•Fauvism’s use of bright colors as
a language
•Cubism’s distortion of reality
On White II
Wassily Kandinsky

4. Additional Influences
•Artists wanted to create a movement which would capture fundamental
changes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries
•Philosophy
•Technology
Science
•Reflection of society at the time

5. Key Abstract Artists
•Wassily Kandinsky
•Kasimir Malevich
•Piet Mondrian

6. Wassily Kandinsky
• Born December 16, 1866
• One of the first creators of pure abstraction

7. Inspiration
• Color
• Sound
• MUSIC

8. Background
• Kandinsky learned from multiple sources.
– Composing music
– Natural colors
– Other artists
• Fauvism had often appeared in the beginning
of his work.

9. • “ Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the
harmonies, the soul is the piano with
many strings. The artist is the hand that
plays, touching one key or another, to
cause vibrations in the soul.”

10. Blue rider (1903)

11. Blue rider period
• Kandinsky's paintings from this period are large, expressive
colored masses evaluated independently from forms and lines

12. Composition VI Composition VII