Kandinsky had an impressive understanding of composition and layout, even his seemingly random abstract pieces were painstakingly thought out. If we apply the golden spiral to his painting, we can see a whole new meaning to the arrangement of the abstract shapes.
The tightly grouped lines in the top-right corner almost perfectly match the focal point where the golden spiral curls in on itself, and the large black and purple circle meets the beginning of the curve. Other circular elements are arranged along the curve's path, to guide the eye towards Kandinsky's focal point.
There are many other techniques for creating visually pleasing compositions, one of which is the 'rule of thirds'. Often seen in photographs, by dividing an image into the thirds horizontally and/or vertically, we can arrange elements at equal distances and create focal points where lines intersect.
Gueorgui Pinkhassov is a Russian photographer, who uses an unconventional approach to framing his subjects. Pinkhassov often uses compositional elements in an abstract fashion; objects or figures that might conventionally find themselves clearly depicted in the centre of a photograph are used to create interesting visual arrangements.
This particular photograph is a good example of this:
Although this image is relatively simple, and appears casually shot, Pinkhassov has spent a great deal of time in considering how best to arrange the two birds. We can see this if we overlay lines that follow the rule of thirds:
