For when I construct lines and colour combinations on a fla… - Piet Mondrian

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For when I construct lines and colour combinations on a flat surface, it is with the aim of portraying 'universally beauty' as consciously as possible. Nature (or that which I see) inspires me, provides me – as it does every painter – with the emotion by which I am moved to create something, but I want to approach the truth as closely as possible, abstracting everything until I come to the foundation – still only an outward foundation! – of things. It is for me a clear truth that one does not want to say something 'specific', it is then that one says what is most specific: the truth (which is of great universality).

Piet Mondrian

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About Piet Mondrian

Pieter Cornelis "Piet" Mondriaan (after 1912: Piet Mondrian). (March 7, 1872 – February 1, 1944) was a Dutch painter starting in Dutch impressionism but soon started to develop abstraction from his landscape paintings. He became an inspiring leader of the De Stijl art movement and group, together with Theo van Doesburg. Mondrian proclaimed 'Neo Plasticism' as a completely new, Abstract art style.

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Native Name: Pieter Cornelis (Piet) Mondriaan

Alternative Names: Mondrian • Mondriaan • Piet Cornelis Mondrian • Piet Cornelies Mondrian • Piet Mondriaan • Pieter Cornelis Mondrian • Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan

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Originators like Piet Mondrian:

Theo van Doesburg Paul Klee Wassily Kandinsky Fernand Léger Hans Hofmann

Additional quotes by 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.

And finally I must tell you that I was influenced [in Paris, c. 1912/13] by seeing the work of Picasso, whom I 'greatly' admire. I am not ashamed to speak of his influence, for I believe that it is better to be receptive to correction than to be satisfied with one's own imperfection, and to think that one is O so original! Just as so many painters think. And besides, I am surely totally different from Picasso, as one is generally wont to say.

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.

For when I construct lines and colour combinations on a flat surface, it is with the aim of portraying 'universally beauty' as consciously as possibl… - Piet Mondrian

About Piet Mondrian

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