PEOPLE!
WAT IS YOUR DEAL with Piet Mondrian (1872–1944)?
Why is his work the only part of De Stijl that anyone knows?
WE’RE PUTTING ON a Flomm event THIS SATURDAY celebrating 100 years of De Stijl.
“What the hell is that?”
An art movement from Holland.
“Holland? That’s a country, right?”
YES. De Stijl changed the world.
“Never heard of it. What’s it about?”
PRIMARY COLOURS, rectangles, black lines …
**bewildered looks**
Mondrian. It’s all about Mondrian.
Which Steve do you credit for Apple? Jobs or Wozniak?
Inspired by the works of Kandinsky, Mondrian, and others, Theo van Doesburg (1883–1931) started the movement known as De Stijl. Mondrian had the concept but it was Van Doesburg who made it truly Stijlish.
The two ended up not-speaking for a couple of years over their artistic differences. Because Theo van Doesburg was young and hip and Mondrian was a fucking chump basically.
Everything is rectangles. In the way music is made of notes and measures, visual images can too be broken down into their most basic elements of primary colour and lines. At its base, all shapes can be broken down into rectangles, and all lines either go some kind of horizontal or vertical. At least, that’s the concept.
Van Doesburg sort of ran with this, except he included diagonals, because it’s the future, man.
Get with it, Mondrian. This isn’t your dad’s orthogonal. The new rectangles need movement! They need to stick it to the man. This guy gets it.
De Stijl may not have taken on its iconic style without Mondrian, or maybe it would have, but I think we can all agree that Van Doesburg is the real life of the party here.
He literally took some bullshit like rectangles and made us all believe it was awesome. And now it just objectively is. In fact, it is one of my favorite things now.
Could some guy named Piet do that shit?
Angles in minimalism are here to stay. Go home, Piet.
—bwargh von doesburg
Flommist Bwargh von Modnar is. Copyright © 2017 Bwargh von Modnar. Pictured: Works and images and items found around the interwebs. Top foto composite by mehallo.
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