This summer, Sydney will host three exceptional art exhibitions as part of the Sydney International Art Series 2023-24; Tacita Dean (8 December 2023 – 3 March 2024) at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA Australia), and Kandinsky (4 November 2023 – 10 March 2024) and Louise Bourgeois: Has the Day Invaded the Night or Has the Night Invaded the Day? (25 November 2023 – 28 April 2024) at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. 

Kandinsky 

One of the great innovators of European abstraction, Vasily Kandinsky (1866–1944) broke new ground in painting during the first decades of the 20th century. In his influential treatise, On the spiritual in art, published in 1911, he wrote about art’s potential to ‘stand alone’, with imagery independent of the natural world. The development of a new subject matter based solely on the artist’s ‘inner necessity’ would occupy him for the rest of his life.

This comprehensive exhibition, curated with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, draws from the Guggenheim’s rich holdings to reveal Kandinsky’s work in depth – from his beginnings in Munich, to his return to his birthplace of Moscow with the outbreak of World War One, followed by the interwar years in Germany where he was an instructor at the Bauhaus, and his final chapter in Paris. 

A new music program explores the relationship between Kandinsky and music, and a specially commissioned artist project by Desmond Lazaro within the exhibition space draws inspiration from the ideas that influenced Kandinsky, to form an immersive and wondrous experience for all ages. For more information, visit https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/whats-on/exhibitions/kandinsky/ 

About the Sydney International Art Series (SIAS)

The Sydney International Art Series is an initiative of the NSW Government via its tourism and major events agency Destination NSW. Every summer, it brings the world’s most outstanding art exclusively to Sydney. The Art Gallery of New South Wales has presented exhibitions such as Picasso: Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris, Rembrandt & the Dutch Golden Age: Masterpieces from the Rijksmuseum, Masters of Modern Art from the Hermitage, Japan Supernatural: 1700’s to now, and most recently, Matisse: Life and Spirit, Masterpieces from the Centre Pompidou, Paris in partnership with SIAS.