Bauhaus: Itten, Albers and Kandinsky on Color

“Color is life; for a world without color appears to us as dead. 
Colors are primordial ideas, the children of light.”  Johannes Itten

Three prominent figures on the faculty at the Bauhaus formulated groundbreaking theories concerning color: Johannes Itten, Joseph Albers and Wassily Kandinsky. 

Artist: Johannes Itten's Colour Sphere
1921. Courtesy Kaufmann Mercantile

Johannes Itten was a Bauhaus faculty member from 1919 to 1922. He is considered to be the grandfather of color theory and established fundamental teachings based on his version of a 12 point color ‘star’.  He approached color from an objective standpoint but also gave consideration to subjective, psychological principles.  Greatly influenced by Adolf Hölzel's eight tier color wheel, Itten developed fundamental art courses for students at the Bauhaus that included color theory. He was one of the first people to devise strategies for successful color combinations. He developed seven ways to combine colors based on contrast of saturation; value; extension; complements; simultaneous contrast; hue; and warmth and coolness of color.  His book, The Art of Color, was an influential textbook documenting
his color theories and techniques.

Study based on Albers, Courtesy: StudyArtHistory.com

Joseph Albers taught at the Bauhaus from 1925 to 1933. He was a student of Johannes Itten and took Itten’s objective approach to color one step further. In his work he organized flat, large planes of adjacent color blocks to show how color combinations affect each other. He conducted color experiments that are well known today. Staring at the black dot on the left casts a yellow shadow in the image with the solo dot on the right. He also explored the effects of space and depth by arranging squares of color.  Squares will appear closer or recede depending on the warmth of the colors, the contrast and the intensity of the color within the square. 

Joseph Albers Homage to the 
Square,  1964. 
Courtesy: StudyArtHistory

This exploration can be seen in his series, Homage to a Square. He produced over 1000 such squares over the course of 25 years. After the closing of the Bauhaus in 1933, he emigrated to the U.S. where he held faculty positions at Black Mountain College in North Carolina and at Yale in Connecticut.  He also published Interaction of Color (1963), a treatise on color theory that was used extensively in art education.

Wassily Kandinsky’s Composition VIII
1923 courtesy: WebMuseum Paris

Kandinsky’s tenure at the Bauhaus lasted from 1922 to its closing in 1933. His approach to color was from a spiritual and psychological place. According to Kandinsky, colors produce a “spiritual vibration, and it is only as a step towards this spiritual vibration that the elementary physical impression is of importance.”   He used metaphors relating to music to describe the artist’s relationship to color. One example is from his book, Concerning the Spiritual in Art. “Generally speaking, colour is a power which directly influences the soul. Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammers, the soul is the piano with many strings.”  He also felt that colors have a psychological effect.  He believed humans have reactions to color based on previous experiences and perceptions. One shade of red will remind a person of warmth from a fire and another shade of red will remind them of blood.  Strangely, my copy of Concerning the Spiritual in Art is in black and white.

References:

1. Johannes Itten. Kaufmann Mercantile, http://kaufmann-mercantile.com/johannes-itten/
2. Itten’s Color Contrasts.  WORQX.com, http://www.worqx.com/color/itten.htm
3. Color Contrast, Brown University http://www.cs.brown.edu/courses/cs092/VA10/HTML/AlbersExplanation.html
4. Study Art History –an online guide for art history students and lovers. Josef Albers - Color Theory, May 9, 2011 http://www.studyarthistory.com/josef-albers---color-theory-255.php
5. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Joseph Albers, 2011.  http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/59.160
6. Kandinsky, Wassily. Concerning the Spiritual in Art, Dover Publications, Inc., 1977. Translated from the Art of Spiritual  Harmony by Wassily Kandinsky, 1914.