Piet Mondrian – Biography

Piet Mondrian (full name Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan) was born on March 7, 1872, in Amersfoort, the Netherlands, and died on February 1, 1944, in New York City. A major abstract painter and co-founder of the De Stijl movement, he is famous for his geometric compositions and his concept of neo-plasticism.

Mondrian trained at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Amsterdam. In his early works, he painted landscapes inspired by the Dutch school, already marked by a quest for the simplification of form and light. Around 1908, his art evolved under the influence of Theosophy and modern movements, incorporating the principles of Symbolism and Fauvism.

In 1911, Mondrian moved to Paris where he discovered Cubism, which profoundly influenced his approach. He gradually moved away from figuration and developed a refined style, favoring horizontal and vertical lines and primary colors (red, blue, yellow) combined with black, white, and gray.

Returning to the Netherlands during the First World War, he co-founded the magazine De Stijl in 1917 with Theo van Doesburg, affirming the principle of neo-plasticism: an art that sought to be universal, based on pure forms and balanced geometric relationships. After the war, Mondrian returned to Paris where he pursued this radical path, gradually distancing himself from his fellow De Stijl artists.

In 1940, he left wartime Europe for New York. In this booming city, he found a new source of inspiration in urban architecture and jazz. His paintings from this period, such as Broadway Boogie-Woogie (1942-43), convey a vibrant and dynamic rhythm, a synthesis of his spiritual quest and the energy of the American metropolis.

Piet Mondrian died of pneumonia in 1944, leaving his final work, Victory Boogie-Woogie, unfinished. His visual language, characterized by geometric rigor and bold colors, influenced architecture, design, and contemporary art as a whole. He remains today one of the pioneers of abstraction and a major figure in modern art.