Piet Mondrian

Mondrian, Piet

(pēt môn`drēän), 1872–1944, Dutch painter. He studied at the academy in Amsterdam and passed through an early naturalistic phase. In 1910 he went to Paris, where the influence of cubism stimulated the development of his geometric, nonobjective style, which he called neoplasticism. He and Theo van Doesburg—leaders of the so-called StijlStijl, de
[Du.,=the style], Dutch nonfigurative art movement, also called neoplasticism. In 1917 a group of artists, architects, and poets was organized under the name de Stijl, and a journal of the same name was initiated.
..... Click the link for more information. group of artists—founded (1917) a magazine De Stijl, in which Mondrian published articles until 1925. In 1920 he published a book on his theory that appeared as Le Neo-Plasticisme in French and as Neue Gestaltung in German. His art and theory influenced the BauhausBauhaus
, artists' collective and school of art and architecture in Germany (1919–33). The Bauhaus revolutionized art training by combining the teaching of classic arts with the study of crafts.
..... Click the link for more information. movement and the development of the International styleInternational style,
in architecture, the phase of the modern movement that emerged in Europe and the United States during the 1920s. The term was first used by Philip Johnson in connection with a 1932 architectural exhibition held at the Museum of Modern Art, New York City.
..... Click the link for more information. in architecture. In 1940 he settled in New York City.

Typical of his art are compositions employing only vertical and horizontal lines at 90° angles and using only the primary colors and sometimes grays or black against a white background. Sensuality, three-dimensionality, and representation are utterly eliminated from his works, as is the curved line. Within these restrictions, his paintings are executed with consummate perfection of design and craft. Much of Mondrian's work is in American and European private collections. He is well represented in the Museum of Modern Art, New York City, and in the Art Institute of Chicago.

Bibliography

See his essays (1945); studies by M. Seuphor (tr. 1957), F. Elgar (tr. 1968), H. L. C. Jaffé (1970), and C. Blotkamp (1995).

Mondrian, Piet

(born Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan). Born Mar. 7, 1872, in Amersfoort, near Utrecht; died Feb. 1, 1944, in New York City. Dutch painter.

From 1892 to 1897, Mondrian studied at the Academy of Arts in Amsterdam. He worked in Paris from 1911 to 1914 and from 1919 to 1938, in London from 1938 to 1940, and in New York City from 1940 until his death. One of the founders of the De Stijl group (1917), Mondrian was influenced by cubism. A striving for “universal harmony” in the spirit of Neoplatonism was expressed in the artist’s new style of painting, which he created in 1917 and called neoplasticism. One of the first variations of abstract art, neoplasticism made use of strictly balanced combinations of various rectangular forms, separated by thick perpendicular lines and painted in primary colors and in white (often predominantly), black, and gray (Composition, 1922; Composition in Red, Yellow, and Blue, 1927—both in the City Museum, Amsterdam).

WORKS

Le Neoplasticisme. Paris, 1921.
Die neue Gestaltung. Munich, 1925. (Bauhausbiicher, no. 5.)

REFERENCES

Reingardt, L. “Abstraktsionizm.” In the collection Modernizm. Moscow, 1973, Pages 130–38.
Seuphor, M. Piet Mondrian: Life and Work. Amsterdam, 1957.

Piet Mondrian

Piet Mondrian

Mondrian, Piet

Bibliography

Mondrian, Piet

WORKS

REFERENCES

Piet Mondrian

Synonyms for Piet Mondrian

noun Dutch painter whose work (intersecting lines at right angles and planes in primary colors) influenced the development of abstract art (1872-1944)

Synonyms