With cold eyes and indifferent mind the spectators regard the work. Connoissers admire the "skill" (as one admires a tightrope walker), enjoy the "quality of painting" (as one enjoys a pasty). But hungry souls go hungry away. The vulgar herd stroll through the rooms and pronounce the pictures "nice" or "splendid." Those who could speak have said nothing, those who could hear have heard nothing.
Interpretation
The quote critiques how art is often viewed superficially, lacking true appreciation by the masses and critics alike.
Wassily Kandinsky's quote reflects on the varying levels of engagement with art, highlighting how most spectators approach it with indifference and a lack of depth. The superficial admiration of art—whether by connoisseurs valuing technical skill or the general public offering banal compliments—leaves the 'hungry souls', those seeking profound connection and experience, dissatisfied. Kandinsky suggests that true art appreciation requires a deeper, more emotional engagement that transcends mere visual pleasure or technical prowess.
In practice
Using this quote in an art critique to emphasize the importance of deep emotional engagement with artwork.
The true work of art is born from the 'artist': a mysterious, enigmatic, and mystical creation. It detaches itself from him, it acquires an autonomous life, becomes a personality, an independent subject, animated with a spiritual breath, the living subject of a real existence of being.
The artist must have something to say, for mastery over form is not his goal but rather the adapting of form to its inner meaning.
The sound of colors is so definite that it would be hard to find anyone who would express bright yellow with bass notes or dark lake with treble.
The more abstract is form, the more clear and direct its appeal.
All methods are sacred if they are internally necessary. All methods are sins if they are not justified by internal necessity.
Every man who steeps himself in the spiritual possibilities of his heart is a valuable helper in the building of the spiritual pyramid which will someday reach to heaven.
Storytellers all, we humans might run out of time even as we triumph over the problem of running out of space. But we will never run out of stories.
An artist is always alone - if he is an artist. No, what the artist needs is loneliness.
...the moon that hung over the garden like some great priceless pearl, flawed and blemished with grey shadowy ridges as only a very great beauty can risk being.
You can't work in the movies. Movies are all about lighting. Very few filmmakers will concentrate on the story. You get very little rehearsal time, so anything you do onscreen is a kind of speed painting.
Fashion comes and goes but style lasts forever
Dancing insists we take up space, and though it has no set direction, we go there together. Dance is dangerous, joyous, sexual, holy, disruptive, and contagious and it breaks the rules. It can happen anywhere, at anytime, with anyone and everyone, and it's free. Dance joins us and pushes us to go further and that is why it's at the center of ONE BILLION RISING.
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