As one of the true harbingers of abstract painting, Moscow-born artist Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) used the basic elements of area, form and color that carried him through several unique stylistic periods in his life, including a period known as "Der Blaue Reiter" and another referred to as "Bauhaus." These two periods, in particular, singlehandedly laid the foundation for contemporary modern art as we know it. André S. Labarthe directs this 1986 documentary examination of Kandinsky's work, which glimpses his various paintings, set to Mussorgsky's Pictures from an Exhibition. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi