[129557] Sheffield : Millennium Gallery - Pioneers - Small World Vl

Millennium Gallery, Arundel Gate, Sheffield.

Exhibition.

Pioneers: John Ruskin, William Morris and the Bauhaus.

Thu 19 October 2023 - Sun 21 January 2024.

 

Small World Vl.

Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944).

Woodcut print on paper, 1922.

 

Wassily Kandinsky was born in Russia 1866. He was one of the most important pioneers of abstract art. Abandoning a promising university career teaching law he travelled to Munich in 1896 to study painting. His pictures combined features of Art Nouveau with his memories of Russian folk art, to which he added a fauve-like intensity of colour.

 

His move towards abstraction began with his philosophy about the nature of art, influenced by theosophy and mysticism. He did not reject representation, but held that the ‘pure’ artist seeks to express ‘inner’ feelings and ignores the superficial. He was one of the most active figures in the Blaue Reiter group and also took up a teaching post in 1921 in the Bauhaus until it was closed in 1933. He died in 1944.

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John Ruskin, William Morris and the students and masters of the Bauhaus shaped our understanding of art and design. They were united by a common belief – that design and making can improve everyday life.

 

During its early years, the groundbreaking German art school championed the ideas of Ruskin, the Victorian artist and writer, and Morris, the celebrated designer and craftsman. Each shared principles of making, community and excellent design for all – before shifting its focus to embrace mass production, handcraft was a central pillar of the formative Bauhaus philosophy.

 

Done