Transmission 1935

Editor: Here we have Wassily Kandinsky’s "Transmission," made in 1935, using ink and drawing on paper. It strikes me as a playful arrangement of geometric forms, almost like architectural blueprints, yet also slightly whimsical. What do you make of this work? Curator: It's fascinating to consider "Transmission" within its historical moment. 1935 was a period of increasing political tension in Europe, and Kandinsky, associated with the Bauhaus, saw his progressive artistic environment under threat from rising authoritarianism. Looking at these fragmented, almost diagrammatic forms, don't you sense a deliberate disruption of conventional representation? It's as if Kandinsky is dismantling the established visual order. Editor: I do see that. The way the shapes seem to overlap and intersect, refusing to create a coherent image, now reads to me like a visual metaphor for social and political fragmentation. Curator: Exactly. And note the title, "Transmission". It suggests a communication that's perhaps not clear, or is being intercepted, hinting that the act of conveying ideas itself becomes fraught, mediated by the surrounding environment. This resonates deeply with the political climate of the time, when free expression was under attack. How do you interpret its position within modernism? Editor: I now understand how this work departs from the utopian visions of early modernism, revealing a more uneasy perspective. Thank you. Curator: It's also made me reconsider the role of abstraction in times of political unrest, acting as both a form of resistance and an alternative way of engaging with reality.