Kandinsky’s “Colorful Life” Sold at Auction for £27 Million

The painting by Vasily Kandinsky “Colorful Life” (Das bunte Leben, 1907) was sold at Christie’s auction in London for £ 27 million, follows from the broadcast of the auction.

Before the auction, the cost of the work was estimated at £18-25 million, according to the website of the auction house. Bidding began with a price of £11 million. Together with the tax, the cost of the painting was £31.56 million.

The painting “The Colorful Life” was acquired in 1927 by the Amsterdam industrialist Emanuel Albert Loewenstein and his wife. After the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, the family's property was confiscated, and in October 1940 the canvas went to auction. In 1972, the painting was acquired by the Bavarian State Bank, which transferred it for long-term storage to the Munich gallery Lenbachhaus, where it remained for about 50 years.

Heirs of the Lowensteins for decades sought the return of the family collection. In 2017, they filed a lawsuit against the bank, and in 2023, an independent German commission on Nazi looting recommended that the painting be returned to the heirs. In June of the same year, restitution was completed.

The record amount for Kandinsky's work was reached in 2023 - then the painting "View of Murnau with Church II" was sold at Sotheby's auction in London for £ 37.2 million. This picture was also previously returned to the heirs of the former owners.

At Christie’s auction on October 14, in addition to Kandinsky, the work of another founder of abstract painting – the Dutch artist Piet Mondrian – was also sold. His work “Composition No. 3” went for £21.5 million.

In addition, the auction sold a painting by René Magritte “Sixteenth September” (£ 2.6 million), David Hockney’s canvas Dog Painting 17 (£ 2.8 million), Pablo Picasso’s still life “A pack of tobacco, a vase with flowers, a newspaper, a glass and a bottle” (£ 1.6 million), Henri Matisse’s canvas “Oceania, the Sea” (£ 2.7 million) and other works of famous artists.

"The Colorful Life" is considered one of the key in Kandinsky's early work and an important stage in his transition to abstraction. The painting was painted in 1907 in Paris, where the artist immersed himself in the local avant-garde scene. The work combines the influence of Russian folklore and French Fauvism: the canvas measuring 130.5 by 162.6 cm depicts pilgrims, peasants, church figures, a couple in love and a mother with a child against the background of the landscape.

Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) was born in Moscow and studied law and economics at Moscow University. At the age of 30, he gave up his academic career and moved to Munich, where he began painting professionally. In 1911, together with the artist Franz Mark, he founded the Blue Rider association, whose members advocated the renewal of the artistic language. In the same year he published his theoretical work “On the Spiritual in Art”, devoted to the role of color and form in painting.

After the outbreak of the First World War, Kandinsky returned to Russia, where he participated in the organization of art education and museum work. In 1921 he returned to Germany, and from 1922 he taught at the Bauhaus School. After the Nazis came to power in 1933, he moved to France, where he lived for the rest of his life.

Among Kandinsky’s most famous works are Composition VII (1913), In a Black Square (1923), Several Circles (1926) and Yellow – Red – Blue (1925). His works are in the collections of the largest museums in the world, including the Pompidou Center in Paris, the Guggenheim Museum in New York and the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow.

On October 18, the Moscow Auction House will hold auctions, the catalog of which includes 320 lots with a total estimated value of 1.5 billion rubles. Among the most expensive works is the landscape of Vasily Kandinsky “Summer Day. Noon” with a preliminary estimate of 90 million rubles.