Words of Wisdom — February 23, 2015

Wassily Kandinksy: Every Work of Art is the Child of Its Age

“Every work of art is the child of its age and, in many cases, the mother of our emotions.”

A weekly newsletter featuring the biggest ideas from the smartest people

Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) was a Russian painter and theorist credited as one of the fathers of abstract art. A late bloomer, Kandinsky began studying art and painting at the age of 30. Before then, he had been a successful teacher of law and economics. Kandinsky’s career would take him from Moscow to Munich to Paris, seeking artistic refuge in each new place he settled. His theoretical writings on the spirituality of art were just as influential as his colorful and expressive paintings.

“Every work of art is the child of its age and, in many cases, the mother of our emotions.”

Source: Concerning the Spiritual in Art, 1911

A weekly newsletter featuring the biggest ideas from the smartest people

Culture & Religion

Repairing the World: The Road to The Rothko Chapel

Of the many concepts of Judaism artist Mark Rothko took to heart, the idea of tikkun olam, Hebrew for “repairing the world,” penetrated the deepest. In Mark Rothko: Toward the Light in the Chapel, academic and a cultural historian Annie Cohen-Solal cuts to the heart of Rothko’s life and art and sheds new light on how both seemingly had to end at The Rothko Chapel (shown above), the Houston home of Rothko’s final works that he tragically didn’t live long enough to see himself. In this tightly focused new biography, Cohen-Solal shows us both how The Rothko Chapel culminates Rothko’s life-long mission to repair his world and how it continues to serve as a light of hope in our darkening world.