Description
Variations (Progressive Motif) is a painting by Paul Klee from 1927: a nearly square surface is divided into a grid of rectangles in pale blue, grey and cream, and each one is filled with fine parallel lines in brown, red and blue that change direction from one field to the next. Over the grid, the outlines of buildings with two towers and stepped forms are lightly drawn. The original is oil and watercolour on canvas, 40.6 x 40 cm, and belongs to The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Our painter paints it for you by hand on canvas, in oil or acrylic, in 8 square sizes from 35 x 35 to 180 x 180 cm or made to measure. You get a photograph of the finished painting before we send it.
| Title: | Variations (Progressive Motif) |
| Other titles: | Variationen (progressives Motiv) (German title) · Variazioni (motivo progressivo) (Italian title) |
| Painter: | Paul Klee (1879–1940) |
| Year painted: | 1927 |
| Original size: | 40.6 cm x 40 cm (height x width) |
| Original technique: | Oil and watercolour on canvas |
| Painting style: | Modernism |
| Located at: | The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA |
| Our reproduction: | Hand-painted in oil or acrylic on canvas, 8 sizes or made to measure |
Variations (Progressive Motif) – Paul Klee
What does Variations (Progressive Motif) show?
At first glance it is a calm, almost square surface divided into a regular grid of rectangles. Pale blue dominates along the edges and turns to warm grey and cream towards the middle, so a light patch seems to rest in the centre of a sky.
Every rectangle is filled with thin parallel lines in brown, reddish and grey-blue. In the outer fields they mostly run horizontally; nearer the centre they turn vertical or diagonal, and in a few places they cross into a fine mesh.
Over this grid, in the same fine line, Klee drew a cluster of buildings. Two towers with sloping roofs rise at the top centre, a narrow chimney or bell tower climbs from the left one towards the edge, and below them roofs, terraces and tilted planes step downwards. At the top right are Klee’s signature and the year 1927.
What do the words variations and progressive motif mean?
Both words come from music. A set of variations is a piece in which one theme returns and changes a little each time, and a motif is a short musical idea that a composer develops. The title therefore invites you to read the painting a little like a score.
On the canvas you can see this clearly. The basic unit is always the same, a rectangle holding a bundle of parallel lines, but it shifts from field to field: the lines grow denser or sparser, turn, or change colour.
That is the idea the title offers, not a programme Klee wrote down. What is known is that he played the violin from childhood, in an orchestra too, and liked to draw parallels between music and painting. The poet Rilke likened his drawings to music set down on paper.
Why does this web of lines hold the eye?
The painting speaks quietly. Its colours are pale blue, grey and sand, its lines as fine as pencil strokes, and the whole has the hush of woven cloth or an old map.
There is something playful in it as well. The town is built not of bricks but of the same striped patches as the sky around it, so the buildings appear and vanish depending on where you look.
Klee was a German artist born in Münchenbuchsee near Bern, Switzerland. This work has no article of its own, so we point you to the Wikipedia article on Paul Klee, in English, which is about the painter and his life.
Where is the original, and what is it painted on?
The original is in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Klee painted it in 1927, in the middle of his years at the Bauhaus, where he taught from January 1921 to April 1931 alongside Wassily Kandinsky.
Unlike many of his works on paper, gauze or board, this original is painted in oil and watercolour on canvas. It measures 40.6 x 40 cm (height x width), so it is almost exactly square and fairly small.
The same year produced Limits of Reason, in which a red sphere floats above a dense web of fine lines. Also from 1927 is Still Life, with pots, fruit and an Easter egg on a dark red ground.
Variations or another Klee?
Variations (Progressive Motif) is a canvas painting for anyone who likes order without stiffness: the grid is regular, but the lines are drawn by hand and tremble slightly.
If a town built of colour squares appeals to you, look at Architecture from 1923, where two roofed towers stand among fields of grey, violet, olive and yellow. A different, tender note sounds in the watercolour Angel, Still Groping from 1939, a childlike angel with large blue eyes.
Our whole selection of famous Paul Klee paintings, each painted to order, is gathered on the Paul Klee page.
How do we hand-paint Variations on canvas?
Klee’s original is already on canvas, but he worked it in oil and watercolour, so the paint is thin and the weave breathes through it. Ours is an oil painting reproduction made on fresh canvas in oil or acrylic, in the size you choose, and it hangs on your wall like any other painting.
The painter first divides the canvas into a grid in pencil and marks the outlines of the buildings. Only when the thin ground is dry does he draw each parallel line separately with a fine brush, field by field, taking care that the direction changes where it changes in the original.
Which size suits which wall?
In short: 35 x 35 or 45 x 45 cm for a shelf, a hallway or a narrow wall, 60 x 60 and 70 x 70 cm above a chest of drawers, a desk or a bed, 90 x 90 cm above a sofa, and 120 x 120, 138 x 138 or 180 x 180 cm for a large wall that the grid should fill.
We paint Variations in 8 square sizes (width x height): 35 x 35, 45 x 45, 60 x 60, 70 x 70, 90 x 90, 120 x 120, 138 x 138 and 180 x 180 cm. The original measures 40 x 40.6 cm (width x height), so our smallest size is slightly smaller, 45 x 45 cm slightly larger, and every size above that enlarges the small canvas considerably; at 180 x 180 cm the painting is about four and a half times as wide as it is in New York.
As a painting for the living room it looks best at 90 x 90 or 120 x 120 cm above the sofa or between two windows.
Can I have a rectangular size or a frame?
Yes. If you need a rectangular painting, we extend the grid at the edges with more pale blue fields, so the buildings in the centre stay whole. Tell us the size your wall needs, and we come back to you with a price and a date.
You can have it sent rolled, stretched on a stretcher bar, or already framed. Our workshop in Slovenia does the stretching and framing and prepares every painting for a safe journey. The 3D app on our site lets you choose the moulding and nothing more; viewing the painting on your own wall is a different, separate service.
When will my painting arrive?
Work begins once you confirm your order; within 15 to 45 working days the painting is finished and ready to travel. Before we pack it, you receive a photograph of the finished work, and if you want anything corrected, we correct it.
Within Slovenia and to every other EU country it travels without customs duties, and each order is covered by our returns policy.
The calm web of blue and sand fields makes a fine gift for a musician, an architect or someone moving into a new home. If you do not know their wall, give them a wall art voucher and let them choose the size.
Frequently asked questions
Which museum has the original?
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
What exactly is shown?
A grid of pale blue and cream fields filled with fine lines, with the outlines of a two-towered group of buildings drawn over it.
Will I get a print?
No. You get a hand-painted copy: the painter draws every line with a brush, in oil or acrylic.
How big is Klee’s original?
40.6 x 40 cm (height x width); our sizes run from 35 x 35 to 180 x 180 cm.
Can I order a rectangular format?
Yes. We extend the grid at the edges; tell us the width and height and we will send an offer.
How long will I wait for it?
Making it takes 15 to 45 working days, and you see a photograph of the finished painting before it leaves us.
Does it suit a bedroom or an office?
Yes. The calm blue and sand tones are restful, so it fits a bedroom, an office or a reading corner.
Does the title mean the painting shows music?
The title borrows two musical terms; you can read the work as a theme that changes from field to field.
- Subject: a grid of pale blue and cream fields with fine brown, red and blue lines and the outlines of buildings.
- Original: oil and watercolour on canvas, 1927, 40.6 x 40 cm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
- Ours: a Paul Klee reproduction painted by hand in oil or acrylic on canvas, 8 square sizes from 35 x 35 to 180 x 180 cm, or made to measure.
- Worth knowing: variation and motif are musical terms; Klee played the violin and painted this work during his Bauhaus years.
