Art - Wassily Kandinsky (Point and Line To Plane, book by Kandinsky)

Point and Line To Plane

Book by Wassily Kandinsky

On his theories on lines, planes, colour etc. Summary of certain important points I found when reading:

Colour

• Yellow and blue, especially, carry within them different tensions - tensions of advancing and retreating. 
• Absolute black is inwardly unquestionably cold.

Colour spectrum according to Kandinsky, ranging from warm (extreme left) to cold (extreme right)

• There can be no greater contrast in feeling for colour - "black and white" is as customary with us as "heaven and earth"...both are silence.
• Yellow = warm
• Blue = cold
• Green = calm
• Red = lively
• White = clarity, possibility, silence, depth
• Black = obscurity, nothingness, negativity; the colour of closure, the end of things
• Grey = neutrality

Lines

• Horizontal lines = cold, dark, associated w/ black and blue
• Vertical lines = warm, luminous, associated w/ white and yellow
• Diagonal lines = cold-warm/warm-cold (depending on its inclination towards horizontal/vertical)
• Something thoughtlessly youthful exists in the angle while in the arc there is a mature energy, rightfully self-conscious. (on the difference b/w straight lines and curved lines)
• The straight line and the curved line represent the primary contrasting pair of lines.
• The angular line must, therefore, be looked upon as an intermediate element: birth - youth - maturity. 

• The most unstable and, at the same time, the most stable of planes is created - the circle.

• Smooth, jagged, torn, rounded (lines) are attributes which in the imagination create certain sensations of touch.

• Repetition and rhythm in lines
1. Repetition of a straight line in equal intervals
• Simple, primitive rhythm
• Quantitative reinforcement (eg in music, where the sound of a violin is reinforced by many violins)
2. Repetition of a straight line in uniformly increasing intervals
• Qualitative reinforcement (eg in music, repetition of the same measures after a somewhat long interruption)
3. Repetition of a straight line in unequal intervals
• Most complex and intricate rhythm
• Contains both quantitative and qualitative intensifications

• (Curved lines) carry within them something soft and velvet-like.
• In the case of an opposite arrangement of lines (as in Fig 64), the contrast cannot achieve its full sound → softer

• Diagonal lines

• Lines and their distance from the boundary

• Length is a concept of time.
• The more animated the curved line becomes, the longer is the span of time it represents.

Composition

• Combinations of complexes coming together to form a composition → similar to the way solar systems form a cosmic whole → creates a universal harmony of a composition
• Contrasts can even be of an inharmonious character, and still their proper use will not have a negative effect on the total harmony, but, rather a positive one, and will raise the work of art to a thing of the greatest harmony. 

Similarities b/w painting and music

• Most musical instruments are of a linear character.
• The pitch of the various instruments corresponds to the width of the line: a very fine line represents the sound produced by the violin, flute, piccolo; a somewhat thicker line represents the tone of the viola, clarinet; and the lines become more broad via the deep-toned instruments, finally culminating in the broadest line representing the deepest tones produced by the bass-viol or the tuba.
• Aside from its width, the line produced in its colour variations by the diversified chromatic character of different instruments.
• What he means is → different colours = different instruments

Planes

• Basic Plane (BP) is made of 2 horizontal and 2 vertical lines
• More horizontal plane = colder, more restrained
• When driven to the extreme, can create painful and unbearable sensation
• The BP is a living being.
• The most objective form of the BP is the square...Coldness and warmth and relatively balanced.
• A combination of this most objective BP with a single element which also carries in it the greatest objectivity has, as a result, a coldness similar to death: it can serve as a symbol of death.

• Position of 2 horizontal lines = above and below
• Above = looseness, lightness, emancipation, freedom
• Smaller, more disintegrated forms
• Below = condensation, heaviness, constraint
• Larger, heavier forms 
• Variation b/w above and below → dramatisation
• Can be equalised through the use of opposite means: heavier forms above, lighter ones below → attain a relative balance 
• Position of 2 vertical lines = left and right
• Left = looseness, lightness, emancipation, freedom
• Right = condensation, heaviness, constraint

• Movement towards the left (going outside) → movement into the distance → freer, more adventurous, more intensity and speed
• Movement towards the right (centred inwards) → movement toward home → fatigue, languid, slower, weaker