New Exhibition Explores the Evolution of Piet Mondrian

Each artist follows a different path. While some experience a linear trajectory, others bounce from one obstacle to the next, mastering the vision they aim to understand. It certainly was the case for Piet Mondrian, the legendary Dutch painter who is widely known for his geometric abstractions, but whose early work is seldom recognized.

Mondrian. Evolution is a new exhibition at the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf that chronicles the early decades of the artist’s life, when he would experiment across landscape and figurative paintings. “In these early works, it is also very clearly visible that, throughout his life, Piet Mondrian was interested in light, in sunlight,” said curator Kathrin Bessen.

His formative landscape paintings would visibly be influenced by the Fauvists and Vincent Van Gogh, as Mondrian began to isolate his subjects and emphasize color, particularly primary colors, at the turn of the 20th Century. Shortly after, Mondrian shows a shift to Cubism upon moving to Paris at the end of 1911. Curators of the exhibition point out that in one painting, the tree Mondrian paints against a Cubist background clearly give way to a gridded composition that would evolve into the Neo-Plasticism, or De Stijl art, that Mondrian would be known for.

To accompany the exhibition, the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen has published a detailed book cataloging the show for those who cannot make the trip to Germany. Mondrian. Evolution is currently on view until February 12, 2023.

Elsewhere, Triennale Milano presents 1923: Past Futures exhibition.

Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen
Grabbepl. 5,
40213 Düsseldorf, Germany