Mountain Landscape with Church by Wassily Kandinsky

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Mountain Landscape with Church and Murnau with a Church offer us examples of Kandinsky's abstract landscapes, complete with simple, bright palettes which have achieved a worldwide following in the years since. He altered his level of precision across his career, delivering a varied oeuvre.

Both artworks feature tall towers and other architecture dotted around a sprawling landscape. He would construct each hill or valley with a separate single tone of colour, and then lay each item together to form a sort of patchwork scene. He made no attempt to merge any of these tones together, as they were intended to be entirely independent of each other. Kandinsky would also avoid limiting himself to the precise colours of reality, such as tones of green and blue, spreading his palette into brighter tones that would not have been present at the time. This creates a whole new world, based on reality but much more vivid and exciting. This replacement of colour is a little similar to the Fauvists, who would produce portraits with skin coloured blue, orange and green.

One does not really think of Kandinsky as a landscape painter, just as they would not think of Klimt's Austrian scenes when considering his signature style, but actually both would visit this genre of many occasions. The former had knowledge of both the Russian and German landscape and so had plenty of inspiration to work with, and would use different styles for these paintings as his career progressed and developed over time. His rolling hills in abstract form have proven highly popular as art prints, providing an immediate impact for even the most occasional art follower.

This painting from 1910 is another artwork to be found in the collection of the The Städtische Galerie in Munich, Germany. It hosts many of the most significant artists in German art history, and is an excellent location from which to learn about all manner of different styles from the past few centuries. The gallery may not be as big as some, but its collection is of a very high profile and you will also be able to find further galleries and museums elsewhere in the city, for those with some spare time on their hands. Other painters and printmakers to look out for across Munich include names such as Marc, Kirchner, Cranach and also Durer. Just those alone underline the great depth of achievement made within this nation, though not all of the contributors were actually born within Germany.