Piet Mondrian Quotes

59 Sourced Quotes

If the universal is the essential, then it is the basis of all life and art. Recognizing and uniting with universal therefore gives us the greatest aesthetic satisfaction, the greatest emotion of beauty. the more this union with the universal is felt, the more individual subjectivity declines.

Piet Mondrian
Cubism did not accept the logical consequences of its own discoveries; it was not developing abstraction towards its own goal, the expression of pure reality.

Piet Mondrian
.. the Place de l'Opera [in Paris] gives a better image of the new life than many theories. Its rhythms of opposition, twice repeated in its two directions, realizes a living equilibrium through the exactness of its execution.

Piet Mondrian
You must have heard that last autumn I almost got married, but I am glad I realized in time that it had been an illusion, all those beautiful things. Although I have always lived for art, I am also attracted to the beautiful in life and so I sometimes do things that seem strange for me.

Piet Mondrian
The principle of this art [as Mondrian proposes as modern art] is not a negation of matter, but a great love of matter, whereby it is seen in the highest, most intense manner possible, and depicted in the artistic creation.

Piet Mondrian
The new vision.... does not proceed from a fixed point. Its viewpoint is everywhere, and not limited to any one position [in space]. Nor is it bound by space or time (in accordance with the theory of relativity) [of Einstein]. In practice, the viewpoint is in front of the plane... Thus this new vision sees architecture as a multiplicity of planes; again flat. This multiplicity composes itself (in an abstract sense) into a flat image [where Van Doesburg emphasis the dynamic position of the viewer – a central idea of Futurism.

Piet Mondrian
Only now [1943] I become conscious that my work in black, white and little color planes has been merely 'drawing' in oil color. In drawing, the lines are the principal means of expressions... In painting, however, the lines are absorbed by the color planes; but the limitations of the planes show themselves as lines and conserve their great value.

Piet Mondrian
The free placement of the means of expression is a privilege enjoyed exclusively by painting. The sister arts, sculpture and architecture, are more restricted in this respect. The other arts enjoy even less scope in their employment of the means of expression..

Piet Mondrian
In order to approach the spiritual in art, one employs reality as little as possible…This explains logically why primary forms are employed. Since these forms are abstract, an abstract art comes into being.

Piet Mondrian
The essence of painting has actually always been to make it [the universal] plastically perceptible through colour and line.

Piet Mondrian
Now the only problem is to destroy these lines also through mutual opposition...[note under his letter]: I think that the destructive element is too much neglected in art.

Piet Mondrian
To show that this end [of art by its dissolution into real life] is only a beginning, it is essential that.... the series of galleries [of the future museum of modern art] be followed by a room in which painting and sculpture will be realized by the interior itself.... demonstrating that what is lost for art is gained for life. This room could therefore be designed for use as a lecture room, a restaurant.... as a bar with an American jazz band.

Piet Mondrian
Having red several of your books, I wonder if you [Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Anthroposophy] could find the time to read my brochure 'Le Néo-Plasticisme', which I am closing. I believe that Neo-Plasticism is the art of the foreseeable future for all true anthroposophists and theosophists. Neo-Plasticism creates harmony through the equivalence of the two extremes: the universal and the individual. The former by 'revelation', the latter by 'deduction'... It was impossible to bring about an equilibrium of relationships other than by destroying the 'form', and replacing it by a new 'universal' expressive means.

Piet Mondrian
I think you too recognize the important relationship between philosophy and art, and it is just this relationship that most painters deny. The great masters do grasp it, unconsciously; but I believe that a painter's conscious spiritual knowledge will have a much greater influence upon his art, and that it would be due only to a weakness in him, or lack of genius, should this spiritual knowledge be harmful to his art...

Piet Mondrian
My new installment [Mondrian moved to a new studio in Paris, where he applied the principles of Neo-Plasticism into the interior of his studio] is about decoration, occasioned by my studio here, where I've set up a sort of display. I couldn't work directly on the walls, so I had to make do with pieces of painted cardboard. But in any case, I am now convinced that in this way it is possible to realize Neo-Plasticism in the interior. Of course I had to paint the furniture as well. It was worth the effort, as it has a favourable influence on my work.

Piet Mondrian
Observing sea, sky and stars, I sought to indicate their plastic function through a multiplicity of crossing verticals and horizontals. Impressed by the vastness of Nature, I was trying to express its expansion, rest and unity.

Piet Mondrian
We arrive at a portrayal of other things, such as the laws governing matter. These are the great generalities – Which do not change.

Piet Mondrian
[the double line in his paintings] is still one line, as in the case of your grooves [the wide sunken lines in the relief's, artist Gorin made that time]... In my last things the double line widens to form a plane, and yet it remains a line. Be that as it may, I believe that this question is one of those which lie beyond the realm of theory, and which are of such subtlety that they are rooted in the mystery of 'art'. But all that is not yet clear in my mind.

Piet Mondrian
For the present at least [1909] I shall restrict my work to the ordinary world of the senses, since that is the world in which we still live. But nevertheless art even now form a transition to the finer regions, which perhaps I am incorrect in calling spiritual, for everything that has form is not yet spiritual, as I read somewhere. But it is nonetheless the path of ascension away from matter. Well dear Querido, with many heartfelt wishes, Piet Mondriaan.

Piet Mondrian
Art on the contrary sought this harmony in practice [of art itself]. More and more in its creations it has given inwardness to that what surrounds us in nature, until, in Neo-Plasticism, nature is no longer dominant. This achievement of balance may prepare the way for the fulfillment of man and signal the end of (what we call) art.

Piet Mondrian
On his two paintings 'Sea' and 'Trees':
If the masculine is the vertical line, then a man will recognize this element in the rising line of a forest; in the horizontal lines of the sea he will see his complement. Woman, with the horizontal line as element, sees herself in the recumbent lines of the sea, and her complement in the vertical lines of the forest.

Piet Mondrian
The only problem in art is to achieve a balance between subjective and objective.

Piet Mondrian
I very much like Arp's things. I consider him the only 'pure' artist after Neo/Plasticism.

Piet Mondrian
The unconscious in us warns us that in art we have to followoneparticular path. And if wefollow it, it isnotthe sign of anunconscious act.On the contrary, it showsthat there is in our ordinary consciousness a greater awareness of our unconsciousness.

Piet Mondrian
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.

Piet Mondrian
Evolution is always the work of pioneers, and their followers are always small in number. This following is not a clique; it is the result of all the existing social forces; it is composed of all those who through innate or acquired capacity are ready to represent the existing degree of human revolution.

Piet Mondrian
In art the search for a content which is collectively understandable is false; the content will always be individual.

Piet Mondrian
Art is not made for anybody and is, at the same time, for everybody.

Piet Mondrian
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.

Piet Mondrian
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.

Piet Mondrian