Piet Mondrian

Our midterm is pretty much the same as last year, a post & in class assignment based on an artist. I think I put this off so much because I didn't enjoy doing it last year, and I'm still tired out from focusing on Edgar Degas. Anyway.

This year, from a list of 50, I have picked Piet Mondrian. I think it's interesting how he made paintings that looked so simple, yet really meant much more, like myself. I think I might regret picking him, seeing as how I have to do a "notetaking page", and I feel Ill use all my ideas on that, rather than in class.

"The Grey Tree", my favorite of his work.

Piet was born in The Netherlands in 1872. Growing up with an artistic father and uncle, art came to him easily and was always an interest of his. As an adult, his career was in education, with painting still being a primary key to his life. He always painted with symbolism and representations. Soon, he felt a passion for cubism developing, and moved to Paris. He dropped an extra "a" from his name (previously Mondriaan), and began to paint less representationally, but with more shapes and figures. While visiting home in 1914, WW1 had begun and he was forced to wait out the duration of it back in The Netherlands. He gained the term "Neoplasticism", his new style, which he is most famous for. Lines & squares, some with primary colors, mostly cover his canvas, and to describe his paintings and feelings, here is a quote of his written in a letter: 

[I construct lines and color combinations on a flat surface, in order to express general beauty with the utmost awareness. Nature (or, that which I see) inspires me, puts me, as with any painter, in an emotional state so that an urge comes about to make something, but I want to come as close as possible to the truth and abstract everything from that, until I reach the foundation (still just an external foundation!) of things… I believe it is possible that, through horizontal and vertical lines constructed with awareness, but not with calculation, led by high intuition, and brought to harmony and rhythm, these basic forms of beauty, supplemented if necessary by other direct lines or curves, can become a work of art, as strong as it is true.]

"New York City"

"Composition with Yellow, Blue, and Red"

As a painter, I understand completely the compelling urge he speaks of. I love that he has put this into as basic a  statement as possible while still properly depicting the passionate feeling one gets when they want to paint. 

In 1919 he moved back to Paris, and stayed there for another 19 years. During this time he continued to develop his style and play around with the white/line/color ratio. 

Mondrian left Paris in 1938 in the face of advancing fascism and moved to London. After the Netherlands were invaded and Paris fell in 1940, he left London for Manhattan, where he would remain until his death. **

Before his death, he began to continue his vertical/horizontal line paintings, but rather than have the color of the line always be a black or dark grey, he began to play around more with primary colors, adding depth furthur into his paintings. 

Piet Mondrian died of pneumonia on February 1, 1944 and was interred in the Cypress Hills Cemetary in Brooklyn, Ney York. **
It will be interesting to attempt a "book page" with his influence. Now to work on my "notetaking" page..




** Taken directly from an online source due to lack of better wording.