Composition of Circles and Semicircles exemplifies the type of nonobjective painting Sophie Taeuber-Arp began to create around 1930. A deceptively simple-looking arrangement of blue, white, and red forms on a black background framed by white, this piece has actually been carefully worked out so that its flat, hard-edged, geometric shapes seem visually balanced. At the same time, the varying levels of intensity among the colors used, and the unexpected placement of whole, versus half circles, gives the painting a strong sense of implied movement-which many scholars believe has its source in the artist's extensive choreographic experience.

Taeuber-Arp's visual art has a serene beauty that requires no theoretical, political, or spiritual justification. This painting demonstrates the direction in which Taeuber-Arp moved after completing an earlier series of related works that are composed exclusively of rectilinear forms. She also produced polychrome wood reliefs dealing with the same aesthetic issues. As a young artist Taeuber-Arp was influenced by the work of such painters as Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky. In turn, the elegance and spareness of her art influenced several of her contemporaries, most notably her husband, Jean Arp, and Sonia Terk Delaunay.