Vignette next to "The Language of Form and Color" ("Formen- und Farbensprache") (headpiece, page 43) from Über das Geistige in der Kunst (Concerning the Spiritual in Art)

Vignette next to "The Language of Form and Color" ("Formen- und Farbensprache") (headpiece, page 43) from Über das Geistige in der Kunst (Concerning the Spiritual in Art) is a pivotal 1911 work by Vasily Kandinsky. This powerful, small-scale image, executed as a woodcut, serves as a visual headpiece to the chapter detailing the spiritual resonance of color and line, a core component of the artist’s theoretical framework for non-objective painting. The woodcut medium, chosen for its sharp contrasts, lends a definitive clarity to the abstract forms that characterize the nascent period of abstraction championed by Kandinsky.

The book, Über das Geistige in der Kunst, is widely regarded as the foundational document for 20th-century abstract art, asserting that composition should derive from an "inner necessity" rather than external reality. The illustrations, including this headpiece, visually translated these radical ideas. Kandinsky utilized graphic media extensively to create the eleven woodcuts included in the volume, balancing bold black and white shapes to symbolize his profound search for pure visual language.

While much of the theoretical work was developed during his time in Germany, the illustrated book received crucial international visibility due to its French publication run. This facilitated its swift circulation among European avant-garde circles. As a component of a mass-produced volume, the work exists as one of many fine art prints that disseminated Kandinsky’s revolutionary aesthetic philosophy across the globe. This important example of early abstraction, dating from 1911 and demonstrating the artist’s theoretical rigor, is classified as an Illustrated Book and is held within the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).