Kandinsky's "Kleine Welten" and Utopian City Plans
- ISSN: 00379808
Abstract
Wassily Kandinsky's Kleine Welten (Small Worlds) was printed at the Bauhaus in 1922, shortly after he joined the faculty in Weimar, having left his post with the People's Commissariat for Enlightenment in Moscow. Kleine Welten illustrates how Kandinsky's utopian visions of community united with Walter Gropius's changing visions for the Bauhaus. Through an examination of Kandinsky's writings and drawings, as well as the historical conditions of their making, it can be demonstrated that his Kleine Welten portfolio is connected to material and imaginary city-planning efforts in Russia and Germany. Additionally, it can be shown that Kandinsky's portfolio is related to utopian theories and representational conventions of city portraiture. Finally, Kandinsky's ideas about social organization are shown to correspond to the shifting philosophies of art and life current at the Bauhaus in the 1920s.
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