The Purification of Art? Summarizing Mondrian and De Stijl

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1 The Purification of Art? Summarizing Mondrian and De Stijl Kandinsky speaks of the inner necessity of the artist, of the period in which the artist lives, and above all, of the inner necessity of art. In his pyramidal formation, the development of art relates to the "ability of the pure and eternally artistic to free itself from the elements of personality and temporal style." What does he mean by that? True art frees itself from the influence of the artist's individual style and from the stylistic demands of a particular point in time and a particular culture. Art strives toward universality. Although they don't use the same words, the goal of the de Stijl artists is virtually identical--to uncover and express the inner essence of reality, not its incidentals. Just as Kandinsky expresses in his writing, the goal of the de Stijl artists is the expression of the essential, not the incidental. They aim for complete abstraction, but without the abandonment of content. Content, however, is not the ostensible or superficial subject; it is not the tree, for example. For the de Stijl artists, content is harmony, aesthetically and philosophically. Harmony, as a universal law of nature, is sought through the use of precision and geometry which will lead, they hope, to the triumph of the human spirit over the capriciousness of nature. Two principles will presumably lead to this: elementarization: finding the irreducible parts integration: an indivisible whole, made from these parts The principle of integration leads to a focus on the environment, rather than the art object. The artists of de Stijl do not fully reject the creation of art objects, but it is more of a "laboratory" activity for them. The notion of the object as a laboratory experience is

2 something they share with the Russian constructivists, and in both cases, it may be a reflection of the increased value given to scientific processes and ideas, and an attempt to position art as something akin to a science. At the very least, it does appear to be an attempt to redefine the nature of art as something which is no longer made purely for aesthetic enjoyment but instead can become the basis for producing change in the social world. The constructivists and de Stijl also share the belief that when the integrated, utopian environment has been created, art will no longer be necessary. De Stijl is more explicit about this, essentially calling the utopian environment the work of art. In other words, the goal of the purification of art is not the ultimate goal for de Stijl: what they seek is a path through art to Utopia, a utopia in which art would no longer be necessary because universal harmony would rule daily life. As Mondrian put it in his writing: "We must see through nature. We must see deeper, see abstractly and above all, universally. Then we can se the external for what it really is: the mirror of truth." As we have already seen, none of the movements we ve studied starts from scratch in the case of both Mondrian and the artists associated with de Stijl, a variety of artistic sources contribute to their formulation of art. From cubism: the reduction of form to geometric elements, the elimination of figure and ground (hinted at in cubism but taken to the conclusion which the cubists do not reach) from art nouveau and symbolism: the flat, mural quality of paintings and design with the emphasis on the surface; from Van der Leck (an artist who becomes a member of de Stijl): a desire for an objective language of art

3 from Kandinsky and theosophy: a relationship of spirituality to abstract form from philosophy: the belief that forms and color can express "liberation" of the spirit; art should and would move away from sensuality and materiality towards spirituality (this is also the influence of Kandinsky) from mysticism: the belief that numbers can express purity; the belief that the outcome precedes actuality in a conceptual manner because the conceptualization leads to style and style becomes reality. In addition to this belief, revelation is central to mystical philosophy: this means that the spiritual and philosophical act of contemplation allows the subsequent recognition of reality in a form which is consistent with the goals of mysticism. Ultimately, for the De St.ijl artists and architects the machine is equated with art, universality, and an almost spiritual response. The ideal architecture will have no decoration, will be a "complete space-creating organism" in which the presence of ornamentation would only serve to limit its universality, and to individualize the space in a way that defies the universal essence of space. To summarize the aesthetic goals and principles of the De Stijl artists we have a set of beliefs which above all share a remarkable similarity to the philosophical and spiritual beliefs of Kandinsky: 1) art was always evolving toward a fuller expression of its spiritual essence, a liberation from nature so that it could become a free and true expression of the human spirit 2) art involved the evolution away from impressionism, away from the need to represent something. Cubism played an essential role in this evolution by focusing on the plastic

4 elements of objects (lines, color, form) rather than on the naturalistic elements of the object. 3) the belief that the artist was obligated to awaken the public to a new sense of beauty 4) the belief that an individual vision of the everyday world had to be excluded from art precisely because it prevented the creation of art (this is an important departure from symbolism which prioritized the individual s reaction to the world) 5) the ultimate goal of de Stijl, as the name implies, was not the creation of an individual object but the creation of style. The fundamental elements of this style were line, plane and color, or the essential plastic means of art, and the interrelationships existing between them. Form was not one of these elements. This new art, according to Mondrian, would be an art which focused on the pure manifestation of line and color through neutral or universal forms. Rhythm would dominate this art, a rhythm which would come from the opposition of the vertical to the horizontal, or through concentric curved lines. Mondrian preferred the first which signified to him a rhythm of cadence, something he called purely plastic in its expression. The rhythm of curved lines was a rhythm of undulation and therefore remained linked to nature. 6) this style would emerge from an equilibrium of opposing forces; because an equilibrium attained through opposing forces has the effect of cancelling out those forces, this equilibrium would lead to utopia. In essence, these artists are saying that art paves the way for the new utopian world. th This is a movement which participates in the early 20 century exaltation of the machine and mechanization. If life is more automatic, as a result of machines, then less thought is necessary for everyday life and life can become more spiritual. But this spiritual world is one which is

5 abstracted, engineered, and one in which the collective is more important than the individual. In this respect, the opposition between horizontals and verticals is a metaphoric expression for collectivity and the denial of individuality.