Influences Discussion

In the Pollackesque comments KP and I have been talking about my favorite artists. One whose work I absolutely love is Kandinsky. Here are a few of his works. To see more look him up in Google and you'll find a large number of his works with the Google pics. Kandinsky's work, as with any great art, changed over time. I think he was a master of color and composition with his art falling into ALMOST the full spectrum of abstraction (but not quite as abstract as Pollock.) The painting in the sidebar is about as close to Pollock as Kandinsky gets, KP, and that's why I insist you take a look at more of his work. You don't get a "my little brother could..." from it. The painting that first got me interested in Kandinsky was the circles one I have posted here. I'm not completely sure why it sucks me into it, but I love it. I think maybe my mind is trying to work the abstraction backwards to see it as bubbles, planets in orbit, dust on my eye's surface, something more tangible.

The other artist KP asked me to elaborate on is Matisse. I don't love every one of his paintings like Van Gogh's, Monet's or Kandinsky's, but his use of color is almost overwhelming, which fascinates me. It goes right to that edge then pulls back. There's so much bright color and I think he must have influenced Rothko's ideas about color and emotion because his colors are so in-your-face that you can't help but feel something. My first reaction to Matisse's work and Fauvism, the movement he was part of, was dislike. I thought it was too busy and jumped out at me too much, but I like the crazy colors now because I think I understand them better now. For example, the painting on the right uses a lot of bright colors but they are balanced out by the rectangle of black and white on the side so that the color is a lot to look at, but not so much that you have to look away. In the one on the right the greens and pink in the corners make the other colors pop and keep your eyes on the center of the piece, the woman.
Does this help?