There is some controversy over who made the first non-objective painting and Vasily Kandinsky is sometimes given credit for the accomplishment. Though this is certainly not true it does seem fitting since Kandinsky certainly was the first artist to make non-objectivity "the very foundation of his pictorial imagery." Kandinsky also wrote extensively on the theory of abstract painting. His best known treatise, On the Spiritual in Art, became one of the most influential theoretical works of the twentieth century. Generations of abstract painters absorbed his belief in "inner necessity as the only source of art." Although Kandinsky had an enormous influence on the course of painting and was himself a great painter, it still remains difficult to reconcile his theoretical writings with the work he produced. There are two problems in applying the ideas to the art. First, it is not possible to apply his grammar of color and form to Kandinsky's works with any kind of rigor. Kandinsky sometimes contradicted himself when he wrote in these areas and the ideas should, perhaps, be viewed as less prescriptive and more general than they appear to be. The general ideas about form and color do apply to his own works. The second problem is that Kandinsky's ideas about the nature of art, the artist, the spirit and the world relate strongly to his perception of the social and political situation in the world at the time. Tracing the importance of these general ideas in his work relies in part on knowledge of the intellectual and social context in which the works were created. But all of Kandinsky's theory, as well as his paintings, ultimately revolved around the principal of art as the expression of internal necessity.
On the basis of its general features Kandinsky's work can be divided into five major periods which contain some variations but are stylistically consistent. The early Russian work (1896-1907) and the early German period...