“MONDRIAN The Art of Destruction i. ole :: = CAREL BLOTKAMP.Published by Reshtion Hooks Led ‘79 Fareingeon Road London 1144 U,UK First published in hardback 1994 "This paperback edition frst published 2001 Copyright © Carel Dlockamp 1994 ‘Monirian’silustrations copyright ©1093, ‘ABC/Mondrian Estate/ Holtzman ‘Trust Licenced by International Licensing Partners 1. Allcighis reserved [No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in arctrcval systemor transnsittd in ay formarby any means, electronic, mechanical, phorocopying. recording or atherwise, without the prior petmission of the publisher, “Translated by Barbara Potter Fisting “The translation was made possible by a grant fromthe ‘Nederlandese Organiaatie voor Wetenschappebik Onderrock (NWO). Designed by Ron Costley Photoset by Rowland Pkototypesesting Ld, Bury St Edimusds, Suffolk Printed and bound in Hong Kong Briih Library Cataloguing én Publication Data Bleshamp, Carel ‘Mondrian: dheart of destruction 1, Mondeian, Piet, 872-1944 ~(Critiism and interpretation 2. Painting, Abstract Netherlands le 759.0402 Ise 186189 1008Contents Acknowledgements 2 Introduction 9 1_The Path of Ascension, away from Mater: The Years ta ror 19 2_ Natural Reality and Abstract Reality: 1914-19 82 The Content of all Art is One: Neo-Plasticist Painting and the Other Arts 4 Centres of Magnetism ~ Paris, London, New York: 1919-44 168 References 24r Bibliography 248 List of Illustrations 252 Index 236Acknowledgements 1g 4 text is a solitary business, but making a book is a collective enterprise. During my study of Mondrian’s work, extending over a period of more than ‘nwenty years ~ but with long intervals — all kinds of support and cooperation were forthcoming from many people. [ remember with gratitude my interviews and correspondence with those who were acquainted with Mondrian himself: Nelly van Docsburg, César Domela, Mrs M. van Domselacr-Middclkoop, C. van Ees- teren, Mrs E, Hoyack, Harry Holtzman, H. H. Kamerlingh Onnes, J. Maronier, Arthur Miller Lehning, A. Roland Holst, P. F. Sanders and Michel Seuphor; for me they bridged a gap in time, Over the years, [ have also been provided with information and stimulating criticism and comments by many colleagues and friends; first of all Joop Joosten, who has always been willing to share with me his profound knowledge of Mondrian’s work, and Els Hoek, my sparring partner in Mondrianology. Likewise I want to express my thanks to Jean-Louis Andral, Mary Bax, Hoos Blotkamp, Frans van Burkom, Sjarel Ex, Jonneke Fritz, Nicolette Gast, W. de Graaf, Bram Hammacher, Lien Heyting, Cees Hilhorst, Geurt Imanse, Hans Jaffé, Martin James, Ankie de Jongh, Frits Keers, Ype Koopmans, Marijke Kuper, Jean Leering, Frit Loffler, Aleid Loosjes-Terpsira, Tony de Meyere, Wies van Moorsel, Sergio Polano, Harry Prick, Micke Rijnders, Evert van Straten, Peter Struyeken, Frauke Syamken, Nancy Troy, Evert van Uitert, Eveline Vermeulen, Martin Visser, Pien van der Werf and Beat Wismer, and to the staff of various libraries, archives and museums, especially the ‘Theosofische Vereniging (Mrs N. van der Schoot) in Amsterdam; the Gemeentemuseum (Peter Couvee, Herbert Henkels, Hans Jansen, Vincent Keijzer, Hans Locher), the Rijksdienst Beeldende Kunst and the Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Documentatic, all in The Hague; the Rudolf Steiner Nachlassverwaltung (R. Friedenthal) in Dor- nach; and the Fondation Custodia (Maria van Berge, Carlos van Hasselt, Anne van der Jagt) in Paris. Finally, 1 want to thank all those who have given their unstinting support to the production of the book: thase many owners of works who provided photographs, the staff of my publishers; and last, but not least, Barbara Potter Fasting, for her fluent translation of my text. In this book, the artis’s name is consistently spelt Mondrian (except in quotations and book titles), although he only adopted this form in ror2 (the family name is spelt Mondriaan), ‘The tiles of Mondrian’s abstract compositions have more or less been stan- dardized. Mondrian himself was far from consistent in this respect. Entering « painting for an exhibition, he usually added a number or a letter to the title but at the next exhibition the same painting might bear a different number ar letter, or even a different title. Thus I prefer a descriptive title, eg. Composition with Red, Yellow and Blue to the more haphazard Composition No. g or Composition B.Introduction When one considers Mondrian’s status as one of the great artists of the twentieth century, it is surprising to discover that relatively little has beea written about biso.. During his fairly long life — he reached the age of 71 — there was almost nothing, of any substance in print: no books or catalogues, only exhibition reviews and a few magazine articles. Aficr his death, there was a growing interest in his wark and writings, and the number of publications increased accordingly. ‘Today they fill a fair-sized shelf, but even this is modest in comparison with the shelves taken up with publications on Matisse and Picasso, Duchamp and Kandinsky or, more recently, on Beuys, Johns and Warhol, ‘There are a number of possible explanations for this fact. In the first place, Mondrian's abstract paintings, on which his fame largely rests, are so spare that they seem almost to defy interpretation. Indeed), they offer art histarians precious, litle opportunity to display their detective skills by ferreting out the artistic inspira tion and thematic sources underlying Mondrian’s work. In the second place, Mondrian’s theoretical writings are extremely difficult to fathom, even for those who are fluent in the three languages he employed, Dutch, French and English, ‘The arguments arc so laborious and long-winded that the reader's staying-power is often sorely taxed. Even the most persevering devotee is forced to admit, after repeated readings, that not everything in these texts is clear to him. A third factor that complicates the task of anyone writing on Mondrian is that his uninterrupted striving to see the individual absorbed by the universal was carried almost to extremes in his own life. He permitted the outside world very few glimpses of his own individuality. When he died, in New York, on 1 February 1044, his entire estate consisted of litle more than painting materials, a few pieces of furniture made out of orange crates, several dozen drawings and paintings (some of them unfinished), a pile of papers (mainly published articles), six or seven books, some gramophone records, and several pipes and pairs of spectacles. The only personal papers he had kept were items such as his birth cert cate of vaccination, his Dutch passport, an immigration Identification Card, the certificate qualifying him to teach drawing and his membership card of the Theo- sophical Society. There were virtually no letters addressed to him, But Mondrian could not prevent those with whom he had corresponded from saving his letters. Extensive bodies of correspondence, such as those with fellow artist ‘Theo van Doesburg, the architect J. J. P. Oud and the collector Sal Slijper, have been preserved. Nor could he erase the powerful impression he had made on certain friends and acquaintances. Already, in his own Iifetime he had been portrayed in various novels, such as Maalstroom (Maclstrom) by Henritte Mooy, De Vader en de Zeon (Che Father and the Son) by Louis Saalborn and Michel Seuphor's Les écasions d’Otivier Trickmansholm (The Escapes of Olivier Triekman- sholm), as well as an inane crime story that appeared in Het qulden Meisjexbook But tt ws note that art ~ oven on a abstract Fevel ~ has never ben confined 40 “idea's at as alias been the ‘realize expression of equlibriem, ‘Mondrian, 1930." Fromtspicee A photograph by AAmold Newman of Mondetan in his studio, 53 East 56th, Sureet, New York, 1942.(he Golden Girls! Book). After his death a number of people who had been acquainted with him at different periods in his life recorded their recollections ot provided interviews: Nelly van Doesburg (Theo's widow), May Ernst, the historian of anarchism Arthur Lehning, the music critic Paul Sanders, and the painter ‘Charmion von Wiegand were among them. By far the mast charming of these recollections are those of M. van Domselaer~ ‘Middetkoop, who together with her husband, the composer Jakob van Domselacr, shared a house with Mondrian in 1915-16 at Laren, a village about ten miles east of Amsterdam. She concentrates mainly on this period, which is recorded in a combination of anecdotes and sidelights on his work and his theories. But there were few people with whom Mondrian had enjoyed such a close relationship. For almost his entire adult life he lived alone, without a family, without a partner. ‘Thus we will have to make do without the inside information that possessive or competitive widows provide, or the recorded memoirs of children growing up in the shadow of a famous futher, which often lend colaur to the literature on the greats of modern art. Hermetic paintings and writings, a solitary and unexciting life, and a meagre clearly not the sort of material likely to attract droves of art historians in rary fame. But while relatively ite has been written about Mondrian, the last thirty or forty years have been anything but uneventful, In the 19505, research led to the first major monograph, by Michel Seuphor, complete with a provisional eexcre catalogue (1956); the dissertation of Alcid Loosjes~Terpstra (1958), who placed Mondrian’s early development within the context of modern art in the Netherlands in the period 1g00~143 and the dissertation of Hans Jaffé (1936), who focused on Mondrian’s position within the circle of artists associated the journal De Seijl. Since that time, many larger and smaller publications of various kinds have appeared in Europe, as well as in the USA and Japan. ‘The interested reader can now consult general monographs, as well as studies devoted to a particular period in Mondrian’s evere or even a single work; detailed stylistic, formal and technical analyses of his paintings; essays focusing on specific aspects of his theoretical views; articfes on the psychology of the artist; editions of source material such as sketchbooks and notes, and a number of separate bodies of correspondence, recollections of friends, and reissucs and translations of his publications, culminating in the English edition of his writings, collected by his heir, Harry Holtzman, with Martin James (1986). And 1994-3, which marks the fiftieth anniversary of Mondrian’s death, adds extra momentum, with the publica- tion of catalogues of various exhibitions being held in ‘The Netherlands and the USA, and the long-awaited mucre catalogue by Joop Joosten and Robert Welsh, Tris to be hoped that the integral edition of the letters will soon follow. ‘This growing body of literature, whether scientific or popular, reflective or factual, interpretive or speculative, testifies not only to the worldwide regard for ‘Mondrian's work, but also to the diversity of views on that work. Like alll great art, it continues to offer openings for new approaches. The present book incorpor- ates much that has already appeared in print, but I hope that it also contains sufficient new material and new insights to increase the reader's pleasure in viewing and studying the work of Mondrian. That is the purpose of my writing, Mondrian’s artis very dear to me, and [ have tried to convey something of my regard to those who read this book.