Painting with Green Center

Vasily Kandinsky · 1913

Medium

Oil on canvas

Original size

108.9 × 118.4 cm (43 1/4 × 47 1/2 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Modernism

Painting with Green Center marks a pivotal moment in Kandinsky's journey toward pure abstraction, its swirling forms and luminous colour relationships creating a visual world that exists entirely on its own terms. By 1913, Kandinsky had largely abandoned recognisable subject matter, trusting colour and shape to carry emotional weight without the anchor of representation. This work demonstrates his belief — laid out in his treatise Concerning the Spiritual in Art — that colours possess intrinsic spiritual and psychological resonance, with the central green acting as a stabilising force amid the dynamic surrounding chaos of reds, blacks, and blues. The layered brushwork builds a sense of movement and depth that rewards long looking, each passage revealing new relationships between form and hue. Kandinsky considered 1913 among his most productive years, completing several large-scale compositions and improvisations that would later be recognised as foundational works of abstract painting. The Art Institute of Chicago holds this canvas as part of a significant collection of his pre-war output. Our hand-painted oil reproduction is executed on quality canvas with careful attention to Kandinsky's characteristic brushwork and the subtle chromatic transitions that give the original its remarkable energy — a faithful piece that brings one of abstraction's defining works into your home.