Lend your ears to music, open your eyes to painting, and ... stop thinking!
- Wassily Kandinsky
In 1929 Solomon R. Guggenheim bought his first work from Wassily Kandinsky, with about 150 more to follow over his lifetime. One of these works was the painting Tensions calmées from 1937, a significant and influential work by Kandinsky, who was then at the height of his career.
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Now, this work is headed to auction on June 29, as part of Sotheby's Modern & Contemporary Art Evening Sale in London, after having been part of the same private American collection for 50 years.
Tensions calmées was purchased by the current owners at auction at Sotheby's in 1964, when it was sold by The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation. A total of 50 important works by Kandinsky from the Guggenheim collection were auctioned off at this 1964 auction.
Color is the keyboard. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano, with its many strings.
- Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art (1911)
Tensions calmées ("Calm Tensions") is one of the most fascinating works of this creative period, when Kandinsky explored the synesthesia of music and painting. He assigned colors to sounds, depicted shapes of music notes and instruments in his compositions and evoked a full symphony of color and form in his work.
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“If there is one pairing which epitomizes the connectedness between art and music, it is the chance encounter between Kandinsky and composer Arnold Schoenberg at the start of the 20th century," said Helena Newman, Worldwide Head of Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Art Department. "Tensions calmées is infused with Kandinsky’s own distinctly musical and poetic sensibilities, with rich jewel-like colors that are carefully pitched, the overall effect highly sophisticated."
Wassily Kandinsky's current auction record was set in June 2017 at Sotheby's in London with Picture with white lines from 1913, which sold for $42 million.
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Tensions calmées will be offered at Sotheby's next month at an estimated price of £18-25 million ($25-35 million) and, based on its importance and the interest that has already arisen, it certainly has the potential to become Kandinsky's most expensive work at auction.
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