Kandinsky’s “Couple Riding,” painted in 1906 and currently on display at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City, features a man and a woman, both elegantly dressed, riding a horse in what appears to be a chivalrous scene from an ancient time. The painting combines two worlds in one picture: the old world in the foreground, and the development of the new world in the background, separated by a wide river. This duality of depiction in the painting contributes to the sense of its tension and fragmentation, whereby the painting depicts two worlds in opposition to each other.
The formal elements of the painting evoke its fragmentation as the painting is composed entirely of these small spots of pure color and slightly larger brush strokes of pure color, as opposed to contour lines. The only source of light in the otherwise dark painting is emitted from these luminous points of color within the distant city. The sky in the distance is bright with visible strokes of sea foam green and purple paint, representing light emitted from the city in the background. The small spots that make up the light in the background are also present in the foreground, where they resemble falling leaves, echoing the tapestry on the back of the horse. Even though these spots seem to unify the painting because they appear in both plains, there is still a sense of fragmentation in terms of the painting’s subject matter, because the painting depicts two opposing worlds.
These pure-color tendencies render the painting slightly abstract because there is a sense of ambiguity in the lack of precise details. For example, the two primary figures do not have facial details, except the slightest dab of paint for the woman’s mouth, eyes, and nose. The lack of details in depiction lends an aura of ambiguity to the painting, in the sense that the viewer is given just an idea of a couple; there is not enough detail that would allow one to actually recognize them. The ambiguity of the depiction of the figures also contributes to the painting’s fragmentation because they appear indistinct like an unclear memory.
The foreground of the painting consists mostly of dark colors, with the exception of some red dabs of paint making up the decoration in the horse’s cloak and decoration of a similar manner in the cloak of the man and woman. The dark scene represents the old world, away from mass culture and prior to the industrial revolution and the rise of the modern city. The darkness of the scene along with the lack of precise details in the figures invokes the idea of faded memories. The horse and its festive attire also endow the painting with a chivalrous motif and an old world feeling, as transportation by horse was archaic in 1906 when the painting was created.
The background of the painting depicts the emergence of a new world, the modern city, characterized by very bright dabs of color signifying bright lights. The spots of color representing lights emitted from the city seem to evoke a pressing, current feeling of energy. The light radiating from the city represents the growth and development of major urban centers, a symbol of modernity.
Kandinsky’s decision to display these two worlds — the old and the new — represents the old dream world in crisis. The struggle between the two worlds also attests to the painting’s sense of tension and fragmentation. The darkness of the old world is threatened by the bright lights and the modern culture (compared to the historic culture of horse riding) of the new world, which takes over the skyline of the picture. Kandinsky places the viewer in the sphere of the old dream world, but the viewer can see the city encroaching. The artist makes the viewer decide which realm he or she wants to enter, giving the viewer an active role in the painting.
Kandinsky’s depiction of the competing worlds of historic tradition and the emerging modern metropolis invokes the idea of fragmentation experienced during the early twentieth century. The transformation of the modern city, along with the spread of modernism, creates distance from the anachronistic old world scene, as symbolized by the river spanning the width of the painting. The struggle between the two worlds depicted in the painting represents the rise of the modern city in the twentieth century.
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