''Klänge'' (German; ''Sounds'') is a book by the Russian expressionist artist

Wassily Kandinsky Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky ( – 13 December 1944) was a Russian painter and art theorist. Kandinsky is generally credited as one of the pioneers of abstract art, abstraction in western art. Born in Moscow, he spent his childhood in ...

. Published in an edition of 345 in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

in late 1912,A Consideration of the Album ''Sounds'', Christopher Short, Tate Online
/ref> the work is a famous early example of an

artist's book Artists' books (or book arts or book objects) are works of art that engage with and transform the form of a book. Some are mass-produced with multiple editions, some are published in small editions, while others are produced as one-of-a-kind o ...

, containing both poems and woodcuts by the artist, forming two parallel strands, each involving a loose progression. One of three seminal books that Kandinsky published between 1911 and 1912 - the other two being ''Concerning the Spiritual in Art'' and ''Der Blaue Reiter Almanac'' that he edited with

Franz Marc Franz Moritz Wilhelm Marc (8 February 1880 – 4 March 1916) was a German painter and printmaking, printmaker, one of the key figures of German Expressionism. He was a founding member of ''Der Blaue Reiter'' (The Blue Rider), a journal whose ...

- ''Klänge'' was to have a direct and lasting influence on

Expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an anti-establishment art movement that developed in 1915 in the context of the Great War and the earlier anti-art movement. Early centers for dadaism included Zürich and Berlin. Within a few years, the movement had s ...

and

Russian Futurism Russian Futurism is the broad term for a movement of Russian poets and artists who adopted the principles of Filippo Marinetti's "Futurist Manifesto, Manifesto of Futurism", which espoused the rejection of the past, and a celebration of speed, ...

andinskybegan writing prose-poems, composing 38 altogether between 1908 and 1912. In 1913 these were published by Piper Verlag under the title Sounds, accompanied by colour and black-and-white woodcuts. in these Dadaistic poems, Kandinsky employs a method borrowed from young children's early attempts at speech; through constant repetition and babbling words are emptied of their meaning, so that only the pure sound remains. It is Kandinsky's aim to uncover this "pure sound" of language, the sound which "sets the soul vibrating."

"We fought for painting, but painting alone will not suffice. I had the idea of a synthetic book that removed half of the old, narrow conceptions, breaking down the walls between the arts.... and finally prove that the problem of art is not a problem of form but a problem of spiritual content." Kandinsky,

''Klänge'', expressionism and Zürich dada

Whilst the relationship between

expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

and

dada Dada () or Dadaism was an anti-establishment art movement that developed in 1915 in the context of the Great War and the earlier anti-art movement. Early centers for dadaism included Zürich and Berlin. Within a few years, the movement had s ...

are complex, one critic has compared them to two twins fighting, 'like

Tweedledee and Tweedledum Tweedledum and Tweedledee are characters in an English nursery rhyme and in Lewis Carroll's 1871 book ''Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There''. Their names may have originally come from an epigram written by poet John Byrom. The ...

', there are numerous links between the two movements. In

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, key dadaists such as

Raoul Hausmann Raoul Hausmann (July 12, 1886 – February 1, 1971) was an Austrian artist and writer. One of the key figures in Berlin Dada, his experimental photographic collages, sound poetry, and institutional critiques would have a profound influence on ...

George Grosz George Grosz (; ; born Georg Ehrenfried Groß; July 26, 1893 – July 6, 1959) was a German artist known especially for his caricatural drawings and paintings of Berlin life in the 1920s. He was a prominent member of the Berlin Dada and New Obj ...

and

Kurt Schwitters Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (20 June 1887 – 8 January 1948) was a German artist. He was born in Hanover, Germany, but lived in exile from 1937. Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including Dadaism, Constructivism (a ...

all started their careers as Expressionists, whilst in

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

, two of the founders of Dada,

Hugo Ball Hugo Ball (; 22 February 1886 – 14 September 1927) was a German author, poet, and essentially the founder of the Dada movement in European art in Zürich in 1916. Among other accomplishments, he was a pioneer in the development of sound poetry. ...

and

Hans Arp Hans Peter Wilhelm Arp (; ; 16 September 1886 – 7 June 1966), better known as Jean Arp in English, was a German-French sculptor, painter and poet. He was known as a Dadaist and an abstract artist. Early life Arp was born Hans Peter Wilhelm Ar ...

had formulated a number of key concepts embodied by Zürich Dada, such as an affinity to

abstract art Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a Composition (visual arts), composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. ''Abstract art'', ''non-figurative art'', ''non- ...

and a belief in theatre 'bursting forth from the roots of all dramatic life' - in

as part of the group centred on Kandinsky at the time that ''Klänge'' was published. Both Arp and Ball had been involved with Kandinsky's group ''

Der Blaue Reiter ''Der Blaue Reiter'' (''The Blue Rider'') was a group of artists and a designation by Wassily Kandinsky and Franz Marc for their exhibition and publication activities, in which both artists acted as sole editors in the almanac of the same name ...

'' before the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

; Arp contributed to the first almanac and exhibited work in the second group exhibition, whilst Ball edited a second almanac with Kandinsky - ''Das Neue Theater'' (''Almanac of New Theatre'') - that was only abandoned due to the outbreak of World War I. A number of poems from ''Klänge'' were read out during performances at the Zürich Dada nightclub the Cabaret Voltaire, and two of these were included in the magazine of the same name, published 15 May 1916.Modernism-dada-postmodernism By Richard Sheppard, Northwestern University Press. 2000, p236-239 Hans Arp was so enamoured of his copy, that later in his life he would allow no-one except himself and his wife (

Sophie Taeuber-Arp Sophie Henriette Gertrud Taeuber-Arp (; 19 January 1889 – 13 January 1943) was a Swiss artist, painter, sculptor, textile designer, furniture and interior designer, architect, and dancer. Born in 1889 in Davos and raised in Trogen, Switzerlan ...

) to read it.

"Kandinsky has undertaken the rarest spiritual experiments in his poems. Out of 'pure existence' he has conjured beauties never previously heard in this world. In these poems, sequences of words and sentences surface in a way that has never happened before... Kandinsky (..) confronts the reader with a dying and transforming image, a dying and transforming phrase, a dying and self-transforming dream. In these poems we experience the cycle, the waxing and waning, the transformation of this world. Kandinsky's poems reveal the emptiness of appearances and of reason." Hans Arp on ''Klänge''

One of the poems

''Seeing''

Blue, Blue got up, got up and fell.
Sharp, Thin whistled and shoved, but didn't get through.
From every corner came a humming.
FatBrown got stuck - it seemed for all eternity.
———————————It seemed. It seemed.
You must open your arms wider.
————————————Wider. Wider.
And you must cover your face with red cloth.
And maybe it hasn't shifted yet at all: it's just that you've shifted.
White leap after white leap.
And after this white leap another white leap.
And in this white leap a white leap. In every white leap a white leap.
But that's not good at all, that you don't see the gloom: in the gloom is
——— where it is.
That's where everything begins. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
With a. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Crash. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1912 quoted from Manifesto: a century of isms By Mary Ann Caws, 2001, University of Nebraska Press p271

Notes

External links

Kandinsky's first book, ''Verses Without Words'', 1903

''Klange'' on MOMA's website

Modernism-dada-postmodernism By Richard Sheppard, Googlebooks

{{DEFAULTSORT:Klange Russian art Artists' books Modern art Russian poetry collections Expressionist works Piper Verlag books