Improvisation 26

By 1912 Kandinsky had almost let go of the visible world. He called works like this improvisations, spontaneous expressions of inner feeling, and numbered them as he went. Look for the clue in the title, Rowing: a few dark curving strokes near the centre are oars biting into water, with hints of a boat and figures dissolving into colour around them. That same period, from Munich, he and his friends in the Blue Rider group were arguing that painting should work on the mind directly, the way music does. Kandinsky had just published his book on that idea. The oars are nearly the last recognisable thing he left in the frame.