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4 Au milieu, 1942 Signed with monogram, dated '1942' and numbered '695' verso Oil on board 19 1 / 4 x 19 1 / 8 in, 48.9 x 48.7 cm Provenance Nina Kandinsky, Neuilly-sur-Seine Galerie Maeght, Paris David Ker, London Sotheby's, New York, 20 May 1982, lot 227 (illus. in colour) Private Collection, Switzerland Exhibitions New York, Knoedler & Co., Kandinsky - Parisian Period, 1934-1944, 1969, no.37 (illus.) Baden-Baden, Staatliche Kunsthalle, Kandinsky, 1970, no.170 (illus.) Albuquerque, Museum of Albuquerque, Early Twentieth Century Masterpainters, 1977 Milan, Fondazione Anotonion Mazzotta, Wassily Kandinsky e l'arte astratta tra Italia e Francia, 26 May – 21 October 2012, no.28, p.91 (illus. in colour) Literature The Artist's Handlist IV, no.695 London, Will Grohmann, Wassily Kandinsky, Life and Work, 1959, p.341, no.695, catalogued, p.391, ill.504 (illus.) London, Hans K. Roethel and Jean K. Benjamin, Kandinsky, Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, vol.II, 1916-1944, 1984, p.1027, no.1133 (illus.) VASSILY KANDINSKY 1866-1944 This fascinating work from 1942 was made during Kandinsky's mature period in Paris, having fled Nazi Germany and his position at the 'degenerate' Bauhaus School in Berlin in 1933. In a dramatic shift from the rigid geometry of his work at the Bauhaus, Kandinsky increasingly adopted the biomorphic forms of Surrealism that combined his theories of a spiritual abstraction with a poetic sensitivity to colour and form. The animated palette of Au milieu is particularly referential of Kandinsky's early canvases that embodied the mystical harmonies of Madame Blavatsky's writings on Theosophy and the sublime variety of the natural world. In addition, the title (meaning 'between') evokes the sense of an existence between reality and dream, nature and artifice. The spark of red, orange and yellow in Au milieu reveals the enduring importance of colour in Kandinsky's work, despite the restrictions imposed by the Occupation. Kandinsky wrote to artist and founder of Der Blaue Reiter, Galka Scheyer, on 19 May 1935 explaining, 'The difference in light to central Germany is enormous--here it can be simultaneously bright and gentle. There are grey, overcast days, too, with no rain, which is rare in Germany. The light on these grey days is incredibly rich, with a varied range of colour and an endless degree of tones'. The use of bright pigment against a monochrome background is characteristic of a number of works on board that Kandinsky made during this period.