Piet Mondrian (1872-1944): Primarily an Abstractionist
Composition A, Composition with Black, Red, Gray, Yellow, and Blue, 1920
Composition with Large Blue Plane, Red, Black, Yellow, and Gray, 1921
Composition blanc, rouge et jaune, 1936
Composition No. 8, 1939-42
Composition No. 10, 1939-1942
New York City, 1941-42
All painting - the painting of the past as well as of the present - shows us that its essential plastic means we are only line and color.
In past times when one lived in contact with nature, abstraction was easy; it was done unconsciously. Now in our denaturalized age abstraction becomes an effort.
The emotion of beauty is always obscured by the appearance of the object. Therefore the object must be eliminated from the picture.
Curves are so emotional.
Everything is expressed through relationships.
Intellect confuses intuition.
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 . . .
Reality manifests itself as constant and objective - independent of us, but as changeable in space and time. Consequently, its reflection in us contains both properties. Mixed up in our mind, these properties are confused and we do not have a proper image of reality.
The purer the artist's "mirror" is, the more true reality reflects in it. Overseeing the historical culture of art, we must conclude that the mirror only slowly is purified. Time producing this purifying shows a gradual, more constant and objective image of reality.
To approach the spiritual in art, one will make as little use as possible of reality, because reality is opposed to the spiritual.
Piet Mondrian
Musique du Jour: Born Ruffians, Red, Yellow and Blue
