Horses and riders, painted by Vasily Kandinsky over a four-year period, show his path toward nonrepresentational painting. In the first picture, the figures are quite clear; in the last, they could be missed entirely. All images © Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris.

Top left: Couple on Horseback, 1907. Artothek. Top right: Blue Mountain (Der blaue Berg), 1908–09. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. Solomon R. Guggenheim Founding Collection. By gift 41.505. Bottom: Romantic Landscape, 1911. Artothek.