‘De Stijf's’ origins in art history
Having at our disposal a chronological scheme of ‘De Stijl's’ activities as well as the necessary biographical material about its members, we are entitled to examine the process which ultimately resulted in the foundation of ‘De Stijl’ and in the creation of a trend of abstract work which was unprecedented and which raust be considered as an original - but equally logical - result of a constellation of facts and trends which have to be examined in this chapter. The rise of a trend of abstract art, basing itself entirely on the elementary means of expression (straight line in opposition, horizontally and vertically disposed, primary colours, primary non-colours) results from an intricate historical evolution which is by no means limited to the history of art. But, as we are considering a phenomenon in the domain of the arts, our investigation should start with the artistic aspect of the process of evolution.
‘Just as we see a gradual development of the New Plastic Art, of an art of
nothing but relations out of the art of painting which was bound to nature in its subsequent schools we see its development just as well in the evolution of the founders of the New Plastic Art. We see their striving as a process of disengaging themselves from the indefinite (the visual appearance of things) and of arriving at the pure creation (beelding) of the definite (equilibrated relations). Still rendering the indefinite, we see them already attracted towards those aspects in nature by which the definite (equilibrated relations) is definitely manifested, in which relation is still veiled, and we see them exaggerating these aspects (by visual means). Is it mere caprice, that they found a suitable subject in an unforeshortened (non-perspective) view of a farm-house with its mathematical disposition of planes (large doors and repartition of Windows) and its basic colour, in order to express their sentiment for the positive delineation of definite relations? (......) Is it so surprising that, while painting, they absented themselves more and more from the natural appearance, in order to emphasize the integral relations? And that, consequently, the composition resulting from their efforts, was far more mathematically than naturally disposed?’46 This is, what Mondriaan writes about the origin of ‘De Stijl’. He links up the individual evolution of the painters of ‘De Stijl’ with the general trend of evolution, which he considers logical and inescapable. He professes the existence of a tendency in modern art which, withdrawing further and further from nature, reaches its culminating point in neo-plasticism. And he stresses the fact that the painters of ‘De Stijl’ have covered that ground before arriving in 1917 at the decisive point when they constituted ‘De Stijl’ and achieved the first results in neo-plastic painting.
We therefore have to investigate the individual evolution of the painters of ‘De Stijl’ until we arrive at the decisive point where their three paths converge and the high road, ‘De Stijl’ begins.
The important fact about this development is, that the three painters of ‘De Stijl’, Van Doesburg, Van der Leck and Mondriaan, each originally had his own special corner in the field of plastic art and so were able to furnish different contributions to their common cause, ‘De Stijl’. As we follow the evolution of the three painters, we shall see that ‘De Stijl’ occupies a very specific and privileged geographical position on the map of contemporary painting.
We will begin our investigation with Mondriaan, as he is the oldest of the group. His starting point was the conventional realism he had absorbed at the Amsterdam Academy, where August Allebé was forming a generation of painters according to the realistic style in which he excelled. But already in his early works, as in the still-life of 1893 (coll. of Mr. Rauch, Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition, nr. 3, repr.) there is a tendency towards the static and well-balanced arrangement. He has a preference for painting in atmospheric conditions which tend to efface the individual forms and emphasize the general outline. ‘I often sketched by moonlight - cows resting or standing immovable in flat Dutch meadows, or houses with dead, blank windows. I never painted these things romantically, but from the very beginning I was always a realist.’47 These lines are revealing, and a painting like his ‘landscape with willows’, approx. 1900(coll.
Mr. Bruin, Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition, nr. 6, repr.) might be considered an illustration of this description. A tendency to emphasize the horizontal lines is very obvious, and the repetition of the vertical scheme of the trees acts as compositional counterweight. It may even have been this rigid composition to which he alluded when stressing the fact that he ‘never painted these things romantically’. The romantic school, in the Netherlands, implied a frequent use of the diagonal composition and of receding depths, accentuated by vivid and expressive brushwork. Perhaps the lines quoted above were written to draw the line between the Dutch romantic tradition and Mondriaan's earliest period. His colour too, is quite different from that of the romantic school: the deep but somewhat opaque colours are sometimes reminiscent of the work of his contemporary, the painter Suze Bisschop Robertson.
The first turning point in Mondriaan's evolution occurred about 1908, when he moved to Domburg in Zeeland. At the same time, he saw and admired the work of Dutch painters who represented the modern trend. When I first saw the work of the Impressionists, Van Gogh, Van Dongen and the Fauves, I admired it. But I had to seek the true way alone.48 His contact with the movements in modern art had hitherto been very restricted, so the work of Van Dongen and Jan Sluijters, who had just starled to employ primary colour in the way of the Fauves, must have made a great impression on him. But the predominant influence during these years was that of Jan Toorop, the leader of Dutch symbolism and of the ‘Jugendstil’. Toorop's art and that of his followers, was a conscious reaction against naturalism: lts means of expression were a clear predominance of line - undulating, very elaborate lines, giving to the canvas the aspect of a complicated textile pattern - a tendency to represent every object in its maximal extension, by an arrangement parallel to the plane of projection. Mondriaan had seen the results of Toorop's work and he always retained a deep admiration for his older friend. Yet, the achievements of Toorop did not influence him directly. He may have become more conscious of the need for simplification, but he certainly did not become a follower of Toorop. ‘The first thing to change in my painting was the colour. I forsook natural colour for pure colour. I had come to feel that the colours of nature cannot be reproduced on canvas. Instinctively I felt that painting had to find a new way to expres the beauty of nature’.49 Works like the ‘dunes’ (1909, coll. of Mr. Slijper, Memorial Exhibition, cat. nr. 43, repr.), the ‘church tower’ (coll. Mr. Slijper, Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition, cat. nr. 38) and the ‘windmill’ (coll. Mr. Slijper Amsterdam, Memorial Exhibition, cat. nr. 27) demonstrate this feeling. And already they announce another change in Mondriaan's work: the tendency to gravitate towards the centre of the canvas; a clearly centripetal tendency. A later period shows the emphasized development of this trend, but it is already present in the work of the Domburg period. The paintings tend towards an oval form, by leaving the corners more or less bare, by allowing them less importance. There is a striving towards linearism as well, but it is not as pronounced as in the work of Jan Toorop. The later works of the Domburg period (church tower and dunes, mentioned above) show a greater importance
of line, and consequently, the desire to render the objects in their full extension.
Thus, towards the end of his stay in Domburg, the painting of the dunes, dating from 1909, avoids all illusion of foreshortening, and arranges the subject entirely on the plane of projection. The possibility of doing this and the resulting idea of tranquility and monumental grandeur must have been the reason why Mondriaan chose to paint these subjects.
There is however, one item in Mondriaan's work where a slight influence of Toorop's symbolism may be discerned: his large triptych, called ‘evolution’. But this influence does not go rauch beyond the mere fact of a symbolical representation and the symbolism in this canvas is of quite another kind than that of the pronouncedly Roman-Catholic themes of Toorop. The essence of Mondriaan's work is influenced more by his contacts with theosophy and its formal rendering stresses the importance he attaches to the aesthetic and symbolical qualities of pure, deep colour.
The decisive turning point in Mondriaan's evolution occurred in 1911, when he left Domburg for Paris on the friendly advice of Conrad Kickert, the painter and art-critic of the newspaper De Telegraaf. There, he comes into contact for the first time with the living movement of modern European art, a movement he could only have followed in a vague, reflected fashion while living in Holland. ‘It was during this early period of experiment that I first went to Paris. The time was around 1910 when Cubism was in its beginnings. I admired Matisse, Van Dongen and the other Fauves, but I was immediately drawn to the Cubists, especially to Picasso and Léger. Of all the abstractionists (Kandinsky and the Futurists) I felt that only the Cubists had discovered the right path; and, for a time, I was much influenced by them.’50
This cubist influence, developed during 1911 and 1912, is easily traced in two series of paintings: still-life compositions (Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition,+ nrs. 48 and 49aant.aant., both in the collection of Mr. Slijper, reprod.) and the series of six paintings, based on the theme of an apple-tree (Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition, nrs. 50-55, respectively in the collections of Mr. Heybroek, Elout Drabbe, The Hague Municipal Museum and Mr. Slijper, all repr.). The former two paintings were executed in 1910, the latter series in 1911. Mondriaan's rendering of the subject withdraws more and more from the natural appearance as he endeavours to come gradually closer to the essential formal qualities of his subject. The most striking fact about the still-life composition is the daring way in which Mondriaan succeeds in uniting the manifold details onto the plane of projection by avoiding all foreshortening and illusionary depth. From the spacial arrangement of objects (first canvas) he arrives at a carefully calculated balance on the plane (second version). The obliquely arranged paint-brush in the left foreground, for instance (first version) has had its meaning entirely changed on the second canvas: it no longer leads towards the depth, but contributes towards establishing a linear pattern gravitating towards the centre of the canvas.
The desire to bring the object into the plane of projection is even more noticeable in the development of the series of canvases of apple-trees. There is,
however, an essential difference between the two themes, which may account for the difference in approach: a still-life is of itself a man-made composition, whereas an appletree is an object, shaped by nature and therefore demanding an additional effort of transformation. The tree therefore, had to submit to various and consecutive stages of transformation, until it had been reduced to its essential and characteristic forms. We are in the privileged position of following the elimination of nature's capriciousness by Mondriaan and viewing the results of this process of purification and simplification.
There are, apart from the purification and the intensive analysing of the subject, other aspects in Mondriaan's work of this period which connect it closely with Cubism. In the first place, there is a tendency towards oval composition; the essential parts of the painting are concentrated on an elliptic surface, leaving the corners of the canvas without much importance. This leaning towards centripetal composition has already been noted in the last work of the Domburg period; it is further developed now by the Cubist influence, and will increase more in years to come. In the second place there is the fact that Mondriaan is so absorbed by his search for form and line, that he discontinues his own evolution of colour. His paintings of the Paris period are composed in shades of light brown, blue, yellow and grey, with an occasional touch of a pale red. All these colours are broken and subdued; he follows to some extent the colour-scale of the early cubists who based the colour composition of their paintings on a predominant use of ochre. The fact of Mondriaan's adopting the cubist colour-scale for his studies in form may be considered less surprising when we recall that most of the cubist painters, like Mondriaan, had passed through a stage of fauvist colourism, lasting till 1907: Picasso and Braque employed primary and violent colours just as much as Mondriaan, independent of their influence, did in or about the year 1908. They all abandoned their experiments in colour, they all reverted to a subdued and neutral scale, as the use of primary and violent colour would have hampered their search for form and structure. It is interesting to consider that Mondriaan, though far from the centre of European art, passed through exactly the same stages of development.
Mondriaan, gifted as he was with a singularly consistent temperament, pursued his experiments further than any of his fellow-cubists. The reason for this persistence will be found in his philosophical and theoretical opinions, which will be examined later. Anyhow, he did not content himself with a satisfactory aesthetic and formal arrangement of his paintings, a mere perfection of composition, he strove to express and to render visible, by means of his paintings, the very essence of reality, which was only hidden and distracted by accidental form.
‘It took me a long time to discover that particularities of form and natural colour evoke subjective states of feeling which obscure pure reality. The appearance of natural forms changes, but reality remains. To create pure reality plasticaly, it is necessary to reduce natural forms to constant elements of form, and natural colour to primary colour. The aim is not to create other particular forms and colours, with all their limitations, but to work toward abolishing them in the
interest of a larger unity.’51 These experiments to reduce natural forms to their very elements occupied the years from 1911 to the beginning of the first world war and even longer. But there is a clear and obvious progress in these experiments, a process of increasing purification. First of all, the swaying curls, which are still visible in the 1911 - last - version of the apple-tree, are straightened and become rectilinear or circular fragments. At least, they approach mathematical distinctness. In his composition of 1912 such curves are rare and nearly absent. They finally disappear during 1913; his compositions of that year are constituted by straight lines and a few almost semicircular curves. During 1913, as+ well, the oblique line is gradually done away with. 1914 brings Mondriaan to the culminating point in his cubist experience: compositions of an oval shape, in vertical and horizontal lines; a few semicircular shapes occur in these paintings. A drawing of this type, together with its preliminary study, were reproduced in the first volume of De Stijl, p. 109 and drew admiring comments from Van Doesburg. The final drawing is erroneously dated 1917. The preliminary sketch shows the genesis of the other drawing: the front of a cathedral was the motif which had inspired Mondriaan to execute this composition (viz. his letter to Van Doesburg, p. 12).
In 1914, Mondriaan went back to Holland for a visit to his relatives. There, the world war surprised him and he could not return to Paris until 1919. The event somewhat disturbed his plans but it did not interfere with the logical and consistent development of his art. Mondriaan pursued his studies and arrived at even further purification: ‘I remained there for the duration of the war, continuing my work of abstraction in a series of church. façades, trees, houses, etc. But I felt that I still worked as an Impressionist and was continuing to express particular feelings, not pure reality. Although I was thoroughly conscious that we can never be absolutely “objective”, I felt that one can become less and less subjective, until the subjective no longer predominates in one's work. More and more I excluded from my painting all curved lines, until finally my compositions consisted only of vertical and horizontal lines which formed crosses, each separate and detached from the other. Observing sea, sky and stars, I sought to indicate their plastic function through a multiplicity of+ crossing verticals and horizontals.’52 This stage of development is most clearly represented in the masterly work of 1917 ‘composition in line’ (coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller; Amsterdam Memoral Exhibition, cat. nr. 79). This consists of such ‘crosses’ in a rhythmic arrangement, within an oval shape. Inspiration for this canvas was derived from the sea and the pier at Scheveningen.
From the very moment that, in Paris, he felt attracted by Cubism, Mondriaan's evolution shows a continuous line up to this point. This line of evolution has been described by Mondriaan: ‘Gradually I became aware that Cubism did not accept the logical consequences of its own discoveries; it was not developing abstraction towards its ultimate goal: the expression of pure reality.’53
Gradually, as well, Mondriaan put into effect the trend he had become aware of. The early 1917 paintings, in their sober simplicity, are the culmination of his
experiments towards a further abstraction of Cubism. They do not, however, break away from two essential characteristics of Cubism: the law of composition and its colour scheme. Composition as yet obeys the cubist law of the concentration of form towards the middle of the canvas. The 1917 paintings are still oval-shaped, indicating thereby the principle of a centripetal composition. On the other hand, colour is not a primary means of composition. The large ‘composition in line’ mentioned above, is practically monochrome, and the other paintings of the same year only show colour as an assisting factor in+composition. There is a definite gap in the development between this painting and the other one, of the latter half of 1917, reproduced in the first volume of De Stijl as plate VI (now in the collection of the Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller, Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition, cat. nr. 80).
The actual moment, indicating in Mondriaan's development the interstice between these two works, may be fixed as being the summer of 1917. It coincides with the dates, mentioned at the beginning of our first chapter, as the date of birth of ‘De Stijl’. The new tendency in the work of Mondriaan does not only coincide with the birth of ‘De Stijl’, the two facts are actually identical. And we must first regard this event as a moment of spiritual short circuiting between various people - the result of which was a complete re-orientation of their art and their research. A few existing papers may throw some light on this course of events, which took place in complete privacy, unnoticed by anyone, except by those concerned. These papers originate from Mondriaan and they are confirmed by verbal testimony of Van der Leck. ‘In 1915’ Mondriaan writes, Theo van Doesburg, a Dutch painter and writer, was doing analogous research. Together we formed a small group of artists and architects: ‘De Stijl’ group (......). We called our art ‘de nieuwe beelding’ or ‘neo-plasticism’.54 The other document, also by Mondriaan, was published in the memorial number of De Stijl after the death of Van Doesburg. ‘On a visit to Holland, a fortnight before the outbreak of the war, I remained until its end and continued my research towards an art, liberated of natural aspect. As I had already (in concurrence with the divisionist and pointillist schools) suppressed the natural aspect of colour, the Cubists in Paris made me see that there was also a possibility of suppressing the natural aspect of form. I continued my research by abstracting the form and purifying the colour more and more. While working, I arrived at suppressing the closed effect of abstract form, expressing myself exclusively by means of the straight line in rectangular opposition; thus by rectangular planes of colour with white, grey and black. At that time, I encountered artists with approximately the same spirit, First Van der Leck, who, though still figurative, painted in compact planes of pure colour. My more or less cubist technique - in consequence still more or less picturesque - underwent the influence of his exact technique. Shortly afterwards I had the pleasure of making the acquaintance of Van Doesburg. Full of vitality and zeal for the already international movement that was called “abstract”, and most sincerely appreciative of my work, he came to ask me to collaborate in a review he intended to publish, and which he was to call “De Stijl”. I was happy with an opportunity
to publish my ideas on art, which I was engaged in writing down: I saw the possibility of contacts with similar efforts.’55
These documents give a decisive answer as regards time, place and persons concerned. We are already familiar with the persons: Mondriaan, Van der Leck and Van Doesburg. We know the date - Mr. van der Leck has been so kind as to confirm it - to have been the early summer, 1917. The place is Laren, where Mondriaan and Van der Leck lived at that period, and where Van Doesburg came to visit them. But in order to establish the condition of the ‘spiritual short-circuit’ we have to examine the respective artistic evolutions of Van der Leck and Van Doesburg. The work of Van der Leck, the senior of the two, should be examined first.
Van der Leck, too, started from the conventional realism, which he had been taught at the Amsterdam Academy. One of his first works, however, was not a work of free painting, but illustrating and designing a book (The Song of Songs), a task which he accomplished in collaboration with P.J.C. Klaarhamer, the architect, Rietveld's later teacher. This first achievement, dating from 1905, may well have given him a feeling for the plane, a taste for the two-dimensional approach. His early portraits, his landscapes and figurative compositions, show little inclination to make much use of perspective or suggest any depth. A typical work, the symbolic composition ‘the farizees’ of 1907 shows this tendency in full development. It indicates an influence of the same symbolist movement Mondriaan came into contact with a year later through his friendship with. Jan Toorop. Van der Leck's trend in symbolist art was, however, not acquired from Toorop, but Springs from the influence of Derkinderen, at that time professor at the Amsterdam Academy. 1910, the year before Mondriaan's move to Paris and his contact with Cubism, is a turning point for Van der Leck: he starts to develop and active interest in the social conditions of his surroundings, resulting in such compositions as ‘leaving the factory’ (collection of Museum Boymans, Rotterdam) and ‘factory-girl’ (collection of M. van Deventer). These works show an increasing tendency towards two-dimensional composition which is further emphasized in the work during the subsequent years. The series of pictures, based on army life, is a welcome opportunity to deploy a number of human figures on the canvas' surface, in rigid parallelism to the plane of projection, f.i. ‘cavalry’, 1911, (collection Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller). The tendency towards simplification of the form continues, all accidental form is suppressed, the remainder simplified to an almost geometrical pattern as in ‘huckster’ 1913 (coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller) and ‘market’ 1913 (coll. Mr. J. Raedecker, on loan to the Municipal Museum, Amsterdam). The various figures are arranged into a frieze, bound together by the white horizontal plane and the superimposed vertical rhythms of the windows. In the same year, 1913, he shows for the first time a tendency towards mural art and its consistent simplification: several works, from now on, are executed on a kind of concrete with mural colours. This process of execution did not only advance the simplification of Van der Leck's treatment of form, at the same time it reduced his scale of colours to the minimal use of all non-primary colours.
1914 brought two important events in Van der Leck's artistic evolution: a journey to Morocco, where he studies the primitive mining industry, and the commission for a large stained glass composition in which he was supposed to use the results of his studies in Morocco. The drawings frorm Morocco (in the collection of the Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller) are almost geometrical abbreviations of machinery, of the pure and sober landscape, of the entrances to the mines, all executed with a subtle but careful pen-technique. The stained glass composition - of respectable dimensions (coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller) - shows an almost geometrical rendering of the scenery and the human figure. It may be considered as the first important realization of a personal style which aims at the suppression of all accidental form and at the rendering of the subject in a precise, almost geometrically abbreviated language. The use of the straight line and its reduction to utter clarity is a logical consequence of this ambition. Three examples of the same year show a similar result: ‘the cat’ (coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller), ‘the foreman’ (coll. Municipal Museum, Amsterdam) and ‘beggars’ (coll. Mr. J.E. van der Meulen). The following year sees this tendency increased and a further loosening of the pattern of forms achieved: the various parts of the composition detach themselves more and more from one another, and the rhythm of surface form is, as a result, liberated further still.
In 1916 Van der Leck reaches the culmination point of this trend: his two+ large masterpieces of the year ‘the tempest’ and ‘labour in the harbour’ (both in the collection of the Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller) show the point he has reached in his line of evolution. The two paintings are both organised into a rhythmic pattern by a sequence of elementary and precise forms. These forms are the geometrical abbreviations to which the complex reality had been reduced: in the painting ‘harbour’ (ill. De Stijl I, pl. 12) there are no curves at all, except one precise circle; the straight line dominates throughout the painting and creates a precision of language, which is still further emphasized by the exclusive use of primary colour. Every illusion of depth, every form of foreshortening has been carefully avoided - the painting is set in its surface, which it succeeds in organising precisely and convincingly. This precision of plastic language, this rigid (but definitely not frigid) accuracy of the organisation of the surface were qualifies, noted and set down by Mondriaan when he saw Van der Leck's work at Laren.
+The next work, the abstract ‘composition’ of 1917 (coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller) dates from the period after the spiritual ‘short-circuit’. It is closely related to Mondriaan's work of the same period and there is about as much difference between this work by Van der Leck and the previous one, as there is between Mondriaan's late cubist period of the beginning of 1917 and his ‘composition’ of the latter half of the same year. We have already analysed the difference between the two works by Mondriaan; we now have to examine the gap in Van der Leck's work between the beginning and the end of 1917.
Van der Leck, in his ‘composition’ has sacrified all subject matter and all associative context. He has abolished all diagonal lines as well (though he has not done so in another painting of the same year, repr. De Stijl I, pl. 1, where
diagonals and subject matter are still in existence). He has retained the precision of language and the principles of composition, the ‘mural qualities’ of his work: in opposition to cubist compositions, his work never showed a tendency to concentrate on a centre of gravity. And he has retained that open, detached arrangement of form on the surface, which is to be an important factor in his further development.
Van der Leck, less inclined to metaphysical reasoning than was Mondriaan, reverted to the use of subject-matter after about a year, and left ‘De Stijl’. What he mostly cared for, was the constitution of an objective language, which excluded all individual caprice. He was only faintly concerned with the rendering and interpretation of ‘pure reality’. But his research into the elements of an objective language, his experiment in mural art and in the use of geometric elements enabled him to contribute his share to the birth of ‘De Stijl’ and neo-plasticism. - Van Doesburg is the third - and youngest - of the painters of ‘De Stijl’: eleven years younger than Mondriaan, and seven years younger than Van der Leck. He started to paint in 1899 and had his first one-man exhibition in the Hague in 1908. The paintings exhibited there were still realistic in the way of the 19th Century Dutch tradition, but his brilliant approach and originality earned him a definite success. There are several portraits, studies of heads and still-life compositions, which show a free and dynamic handling. About 1910, he develops a personal variation of Fauvism, culminating in the portrait of himself of 1913 (coll. Mrs. van Doesburg), and ‘girl with flowers’ of 1914 (coll. Mrs. van Doesburg). His activity as a painter is restricted by his being mobilised during the period from 1914 to 1916. He serves in a regiment on the Belgian border, near Tilburg, and is therefore separated from the possibilities of working or seeing the work of others. But he reads a great deal in these years and he is very much impressed by Kandinsky's book on ‘The spiritual in art’, published in 1910, He is an ardent admirer of Kandinsky's Dutch follower, the painter De Winter at Utrecht, who had arrived at expressionist abstraction in 1914. He published an essay on De Winter in 1916: De schilder De Winter en zijn werk (The painter De Winter and his work; Haarlem, De Bois, 1916). In 1916, after his demobilisation, he starts painting again and his style has an entirely different aspect now: theoretical studies during the military years and, perhaps sketches, which are lost, have altered and matured his manner. But in the year 1916 he has obviously not yet found a definite style of his own. There are the expressionist abstractions, somewhat influenced by De Winter and, simultaneously, a still-life (coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller) with a cubist way of composition somewhat reminiscent of Delaunay; there are also two paintings of dancers (coll. Mrs. van Doesburg), geometrical of form, but with a very dynamic movement and rhythm, which make them, in some respect, reminiscent of the somewhat earlier sculptures by+ Archipenko. The important work of this period, 1916-1917, is his large work ‘the cardplayers’ (coll. Mrs. van Doesburg). The painting is indeed a synthesis of Van Doesburg's various experiments: it reduces form and colour to large and simple planes, but does not yet achieve elementary purity or precision of
language. On the other hand, its qualities are contained in its expressivity: it achieves that strange combination of reduced form and colour with personal expression, which we appreciate in some of the paintings of Delaunay and his German contemporaries.
When comparing this work with its later version (coll. of the Hague Municipal Museum)+ or with another painting of the first half of 1918, (coll. Solomon Guggenheim Museum, New York), the difference is indeed striking, but perhaps not more so than in the case of Mondriaan and Van der Leck. The most remarkable fact, however, is the mutual resemblance between the three paintings of the latter half of 1917.
Each of the three artists had arrived at the stage he had reached early in the year of 1917, in his own way: Mondriaan by way of Cubism and through his metaphysical search for pure reality; Van der Leck by the simplification of his mural art and the precision of language it demanded; Van Doesburg, in his turn, by his versatile experiments in the modern way of expression, by a sound critical reasoning which has always been his forte and a daring approach to the mentality of our time. When writing about the parallels between the trends of modern thought and the tendencies in modern art, he says: The serious reason why I assume these three stages of thought (1. purely abstract thought; thought for the sake of thought; 2. concrete thought, thought for the sake of observation and 3. a stage between these two: deformative thought) as a truth in regard to plastic arts, is the fact that we see these three stages of thought projected in plastic art - or, more precisely in the arts. Secondly, because I have passed in my own plastic evolution through these three stages within a period of twenty years.56
The reasons outside the domain of painting, which conditioned this ‘spiritual short-circuit’, that is, the birth of ‘De Stijl’ or ‘neo-plasticism’, will be examined later on in this chapter. What is important here, is to establish the elements of plastic history which fused at a certain moment in the year 1917 and by a species of chemical reaction produced a new and not previously experienced phenomenon: abstract art, based on the elements of straight lines in rectangular opposition, and primary colours. Thus the elements which were brought together at that critical moment in 1917 were as follows:
| a. | the cubist tradition in its most consistent form, that is to say the ultimate consequence of Cézanne's desire to reduce the natural form to its geometrical elements (Mondriaan); |
| b. | the movement towards a renewal of mural and - or - monumental art promoted by the ‘Jugendstil’ (art nouveau), emphasized by the symbolists (M. Denis, Toorop, etc.). The roots of this movement may be traced back into the l9th century, to William Morris and Ruskin, who revived the Arts and Crafts, on one side - to traditional mural painting (Puvis de Chavannes) on the other. In the desire of the movement to create a precise and objective language of their art and to emphasize the surface, we feel the undeniable influence of Seurat. This factor in ‘De Stijl's’ origin and birth is mainly contributed by Van der Leck; |
| c. | the theories of expressionist abstraction (Kandinsky and the ‘Blaue Reiter’ |
| group) which in their turn find their starting point in a development of one aspect out of Van Gogh's art. The development of this line of evolution - which constituted the theoretical basis for the complete banishment of subject matter - was Van Doesburg's contribution to the formation of ‘De Stijl’. The fusion of these three components resulted, by a kind of chemical reaction which we can only state as a fact, in ‘De Stijl’. But this ‘chemical reaction’ was only made possible by a series of catalysing factors which - as they had nothing to do with the arts - have to be treated separately. |
The fusion, however, did not prove to be very resistant: soon, it fell apart into its constituent factors: Van der Leck returned to subject-matter in 1919, using the newly developed system of the plastic elements as the precise language he had always wanted to employ. The collaboration of Mondriaan and Van Doesburg continues for several years: in 1919, under the influence of Van Doesburg's concise reasoning, they both develop a mathematically controllable+ technique: dividing their square canvases into a system of smaller squares, and basing their composition on this exact pattern. From this stage (composition 1919, coll. Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller, Amsterdam Memorial Exhibition, cat. nr. 84), Mondriaan develops his mature, neo-plastic style, conditioned by his studies in rendering pure reality. He alters the squares to rectangles, and brings these rectangles into more definite relation by once again introducing colour as a factor in their relationship: ‘to create unity, art has to follow not nature's aspect, but what nature really is. Appearing in oppositions, nature is unity: form is limited space, concrete only through its determination. Art has to determine space as well as form and to create the equivalence of these two factors. These principles were evolved through my work. In my early pictures, space was still a background. I began to determine forms: verticals and horizontals, became rectangles. They still appeared as detached forms against a background; their colour was still impure. Feeling the lack of unity, I brought the rectangles together: space became white, black or grey; form became red, blue or yellow. Uniting the rectangles was equivalent to continuing the verticals and horizontals of the former period over the entire composition. It was evident that rectangles, like all particular forms, obtrude themselves and must be neutralised through the composition. In fact, rectangles are never an aim in themselves, but a logical consequence of their determining lines, which are continuous in space; they appear spontaneously through the crossing of horizontal and vertical lines. Moreover, when rectangles are used alone without any other forms, they never appear as particular forms, because it is the contrast with other forms that occasions particular distinction. Later, in order to abolish the manifestation of planes as rectangles, I reduced my colour and accentuated the limiting lines, crossing them one over the other. Thus, the planes were not only cut and abolished, but their relationship became more active. The result was a far more dynamic expression.’57 This is how Mondriaan arrived at his mature style, about 1920, the year in which he published his pamphlet Le neoplasticisme+. From then on, until his leaving Paris in 1938, he constantly and consistently purified and consolidated this style.
Van Doesburg, while developing his ‘elementarism’, described the essential features of this type of composition: ‘neo-plastic, peripheric composition. Very important, an essential renewal of the method of composition. Gradual abolition of the centre and of every passive void. The composition develops in opposite direction: instead of converging towards the centre, it tends to shift towards the extreme periphery of the canvas, it even seems to continue beyond it.’58
Van Doesburg leaves the consistent method of neo-plasticism about 1924, when he created his ‘elementarism’. In accordance with his dynamic temperament, he introduces the diagonal as an element of composition into the hitherto exclusive scheme. He explains his new principle by writing, in the same context as above: ‘Elementary (anti-static) counter-composition, adds a new oblique dimension to the rectangular, peripheric composition. This, in a realistic way, solves the tensions between horizontal and vertical forces; introduction of inclined planes, dissonant planes, opposing to gravity, architectural and static structure. In the counter-composition, the equilibrium of the plane plays a less important part. Each plane has its share of peripheric space and the construction should be regarded more as a phenomenon of tension than as one of relationship in the plane.’59
But, in spite of later changes, the constitution of the elementary means of composition - straight lines in rectangular opposition, and primary colour - was decisive. The creation of a new manner of plastic expression in 1917 was - and still remains - an important fact in the history of the plastic arts. Severini, the outsider within ‘De Stijl’ movement, realised this fact as early as 1919, when writing: ‘Now, for the first time, we have a plastic art that achieves the same relations as the work of Mallarmé.’60 The consequences of this event have been manifold and of varying importance. The first reaction occurred in architecture - but as this first effect of the new shaping happened almost simultaneously and has some bearing on the constitution of the group and the review, it will be examined at this stage.
The first examples of ‘Stijl’ architecture resulted from the studies of the painters. Van Doesburg established this fact by writing in his retrospective article of 1929: Nobody need be surprised that these claims have been expressed first of all in painting. In Holland, indeed, painting had been for some centuries the sign of renewal. It is the form of artistic expression which suits the Dutch people best and therefore it was a most difficult task to put forward new claims in this field. The architects had an easier play. They had no historic traditions to fight.61
The first results of ‘Stijl’ architecture were, therefore, inspired by the study and the work of the painters. Their achievements, however, were made possible by two already existing trends in Dutch architecture and were preceded by some executed work, which already pointed towards ‘De Stijl’ conceptions of building. These two trends are: the development of Berlage's architectural conception, and the influence of Frank Lloyd Wright on Dutch architecture. Two important early monuments preluding ‘Stijl’ architecture are Robert van 't Hoff's two houses at Huis-ter-Heide (ill. De Stijl II, pl. 3, 5, 6 and pp. 30, 32 sq.).
Berlage's rationalism in architecture made a deep impression on his younger colleagues. It is Oud, who has been under the spell of the promises of this architecture. His project for public baths - 1915 - shows the influence of Berlage, though translated into a personal idiom: the tripartite porch, flanked by two gabled risalites, is clearly reminiscent of the entrance to the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, built by Berlage in 1903. And even his holiday hostel at Noordwijkerhout, in which Van Doesburg collaborated with him, shows signs of the developed Berlage-tradition by the consistent practice of a principle ofbrick-architecture. Oud, who studied in Germany with Th. Fischer in 1911 and knew the achievements of architecture in Germany and Austria (the Darmstadt school, A. Loos in Vienna, Behrens, Olbrich etc.) decided in favour of Berlage's conception because he recognized its affinity with the Dutch landscape and character and because at this time, his ideal was to create an objective style in architecture.
Contact with Van Doesburg and Mondriaan, however, made him adopt a more developed principle: he drew architectural consequences from the studies of his painter-friends. The first - an extremely happy - result of this inspiration+ is his project for an esplanade above a beach (ill. De Stijl I, pl. 2 and p. 12). There, the principles of rectilinear and rectangular design are for the first time realised in architecture with sobriety and consistency. In the 1927 anniversary number, Oud describes the influence of the painters' ideas on his work: ‘By this collaboration (with the colleagues of the free arts) I succeeded in transforming, in architecture, the principles of the plastic arts. The result: cubist houses, interesting only through the effort to produce pure architecture, well-balanced proportions, straight lines, condensed forms; an altogether well constructed architectural complex from the aesthetic point of view, with interior vitality, which preceding architecture lacked completely.’62 The next effort, which demonstrated even more consistently Oud's desire to realize plastic balance by the opposition of horizontal and vertical lines and planes, is his+ plan for a factory at Purmerend (1919, De Stijl III, pl. 6) and a plan for a warehouse (1919, De Stijl III, pl. 12). It is the central part of the drawing for the factory in which he most convincingly succeeds in realizing the idea of a balanced rectangular opposition in architectural forms.
All the same it cost Oud years of strenuous, devoted work to progress from his initial designs for a neo-plastic architecture to the actual building. During that period, the collaboration with the painters, pre-eminently with Van Doesburg, had diminished. In Oud's plans during the ensuing years, Van Doesburg was asked to determine the colour-relations, but the actual architectural solutions were left entirely to Oud: the distribution of work between architect and painter, as laid down by Van der Leck, had become a fact for a short while. The building of the ‘Tusschendijken-blocks’ at Rotterdam (since destroyed) was the last result of this phase of ‘Stijl’ architecture - in 1921 Oud withdrew from ‘De Stijl’.
The other influences, which had assisted at the birth of ‘Stijl’ architecture were repercussions in the Netherlands of Frank Lloyd Wright's work. Robert van
't Hoff, who had studied in the United States, first brought this influence to his native country. His two houses at Huis-ter-Heide (1916, ill. De Stijl II, pl. 3, 5, 6, 17, commentary pp. 30, 32, ground plans p. 33) were a prelude to the architectural conception of ‘De Stijl’. They had shown, in opposition to the then current opinion, that architecture could be created with satisfactory results, without any ornamentation whatsoever and by using nothing but architectural means of expression, i.e. planes, lines and the balance of masses. This thesis and its daring realisations by Van 't Hoff, were derived from the work of Frank Lloyd Wright. Van 't Hoff has commented on Wright's work in an article (De Stijl II, p. 40), called ‘architecture and its development’, choosing Wright's Unity Church (1909, De Stijl II, pl. 8) as an example for his thesis: ‘Hereby Unity Church is once more brought to the foreground, because this architecture has been the forerunner of neo-plasticism in architecture, now in a state of development.’63 In the first volume of De Stiji Oud had already discussed the work of Wright, especially the Larkin factory and the Chicago house of Mr. Robie, drawing attention to the fact that mechanical production played an important part in the results, achieved by Wright, principally with regard to the precision of architectural forms and their relationship.
Van 't Hoff, indeed, has realized the different problems, propounded by Wright: his two houses are constructions in concrete - i.e. entirely achieved by mechanical means of production, without any ornamentation. Their whole construction has been determined by the ground plan, leaving no architectural effects whatsoever to arbitrary variations. By doing so, he approached the theory, which ‘De Stijl’ was to formulate a year afterwards: objectivity in architecture. There is, however, in these two works an important feature, which is directly linked up with the works of Wright and which was opposed by ‘De Stijl’ from its very beginning: a predominating horizontalism. Wright's most characteristic buildings had derived their effects from this feature: a broad, horizontal repose, which dominated the secondary and vertical accents of his buildings. Both the houses by Van 't Hoff may therefore be considered as important forerunners of ‘Stijl’ architecture, as they had already realized architectural objectivity by means of conception and of production. They had, however, not acquired the spacial equilibrium which ‘De Stijl’ conceived in 1917. On the other hand, they are of great importance to the development of ‘De Stijls’ ideas, because they did draw the other artists attention to the fact that it was not only aesthetic equilibrium which would lead to a new architecture, but mechanical production as well, assuring the objectivity of construction and of execution.
The next step in the architectural evolution of ‘De Stijl’ was Jan Wils' reconstruction of the hotel ‘De dubbele Sleutel’ at Woerden, 1918 (ill. De Stijl II, pl. 10, pp. 59-60, commentaried by Van 't Hoff p. 58). The problem, there, was made more difficult by the fact that the existing ground plan had to be respected. In this building two earlier mentioned trends merge: Berlage's rationalized brick architecture and Wright's composition of broad horizontal repose. There is however, a new feature in this construction: the balance between horizontalism
and vertical accents has been aimed at and, to some extent, achieved. The vertical accent, by which the horizontal extension of the building has to be neutralized, is furnished by the building's high chimney, that acts as counterweight in a composition of accentuated cornices and the horizontal band of the balconies.
The development of the later type of ‘Stijl’ architecture is less related to the origin of ‘De Stijl’ and must be dealt with elsewhere in this study. However, it must be noted that the influence of ‘De Stijl’ on architecture in Germany, by way of the Bauhaus, should be attributed to this first trend of ‘Stijl’ architecture. The later phase which was not manifested until 1923 at the Paris exhibition, sprang from the development of a more recent period of study in the field of painting.
Before concluding this chapter, we must add a word on the evolution of sculpture within ‘De Stijl’ movement, that is to say, on the contribution of Vantongerloo. He felt attracted towards ‘De Stijl’ because of his marked predelection for mathematical research and composition. This inclination becomes clear from his very first contribution to the review, a comment on Archipenko's ‘gondolier’ with an elaborate mathematical analysis of the composition (De Stijl I, pl. 14, p. 134, pl. 16). His earlier work of the Hague period (1914 and later) does not immediately show this line of development: a ‘head’ of 1915(ill. Vantpngerloo, L'Art et son Avenir, pl. 7) and a ‘fragment’ (ill, ibid., pl. 8, and Vantongerloo, Paintings, Sculptures, Reflections, pl. 1), show the marked influence of his compatriot and companion in misfortune, the Belgian sculptor Rik Wouters, who like Vantongerloo, was an internee in the Netherlands. A painting, dated 1916 (Vantongerloo, Paintings, Sculptures, Reflections, pl. 2) executed in free and vivid brushwork, is also close to the paintings by Wouters of the same period, examples of which can be found in the Antwerp Museum. The mathematical disposition of the artist however, becomes obvious in a painting of 1917 (ibid. pl. 5) which shows a remarkable relation to Van Doesburg's still-life composition of 1916 in the Rijksmuseum Kröller-Müller. It is a composition of circles and planes in a circle, achieving the same kind of abstraction as Van Doesburg's contemporary work. His sculpture ‘Volendammer’ of 1916 (ill. Vantongerloo, L'art et son Avenir, pl. 10) does not betray the same mathematical concern, except as regards the scheme of composition (ibid. pl. 16)+. His first abstract sculptures: ‘spherical construction’ 1917 (Vantongerloo, Paintings, Sculptures, Reflections, pl. 3) in the Philadelphia Museum of Art and+ ‘interrelation of masses’ 1919 (ibid. pl. 6, 7) can therefore also be considered a personal development of the results achieved by the painters of ‘De Stijl’.
‘De Stijl's’ philosophical origins
After examining the factors in the evolution of early 20th century art, which led to the constitution of ‘De Stijl’ and to its plastic production, we must bring our investigation to bear on the facts and the tenets which were the source of
‘De Stijl's’ ideology. As, in the case of ‘De Stijl’, ideology and plastic production are closely intermingled, we are not only concerned with the texts and philosophical expressions which were of some influence on ‘De Stijl’, but with ‘De Stijl's’ ideological and philosophical production as well. As we have seen before, (p. 11, introduction to the first number of De Stijl), Van Doesburg and his friends considered their ideological expressions an equivalent component of their plastic activity. And Mondriaan, in his fundamental article on the principles of ‘De Stijl’ looks at the problem thus: ‘While the spontaneous expression, of the intuition, which achieves a work of art(in other words, its spiritual content) can only be interpreted by the art of the word, there still remains the word without the art, a reasoning, a logical explanation, by which the reasonableness of a work of art may be demonstrated. It is therefore possible indeed, that the artist of today speaks of his own art.’64 And a parallel reasoning can be found in a book which had great influence on ‘De Stijl’ - as we will see later: Dr. Schoenmaekers Beeldende wiskunde (Plastic Mathematics, published in 1916 at Bussum); ‘A new insight into relative objectivity is growing vigorously in mankind today. This new insight must be expressed first in words which explain the general and direct facts of nature. Then, our civilization will again contemplate the relativity of these facts as to the more detailed particulars of nature. And finally, a new plastic art will mutely express this contemplation. However, as long as our language has not yet clearly explained the new insight into the direct and general facts of nature, the plastic artists will have to try and speak in words. Being artists, they do realize what this new understanding needs most and they will speak in words, because the art itself is insufficient - as yet.’65
The complicated reasoning of ‘De Stijl’ finds its source in the fact that ‘De Stijl’ artists profess an entirely new conception of artistic creation. Van Doesburg's articles from 1912 on are based on the axiomas formulated by Kandinsky in his book The spiritual in art and he succeeds in expanding and broadening them. He and his friends in ‘De Stijl’ thus naturally empbasize the importance of ‘the spiritual in art’. Naturally, by doing so, they also find their philosophical - allegiance to Hegel and his followers. Hegel's speculative universalism becomes part of their philosophic and artistic doctrine. ‘Whatever happens in heaven or on earth - whatever happens eternally - the Life of God - and what is wrought in time, moves towards one aim; that the spirit be aware of itself, that it be objective to itself, that it find itself, is itself and at one with itself; it is a duplication, an estrangement, but in order that it may find itself, that it be able to know itself. Only in that way the spirit reaches its freedom; as only that may be called free that is not related to anything else, or dependent on anything else (Hegel). In the domain of technique, aesthetics, philosophy, religion and economy, this process of liberation is clearly expressed. As to the plastic expression of this process of liberation, it is only in neo-plasticism (de nieuwe beelding) that the spirit has gained its liberty by becoming determinate.’66 It is Van Doesburg who thus describes the spiritual background of his conception, describing neo-plasticism as the plastic manifestation of the laws, elaborated by Hegel. And, when writing ‘on the contemplation of new art’, he quotes, as a
motto for his explanation, a sentence by Hegel, starting as follows: The finite is not true, nor is it as it should be: in order to give it existence, distinctness is needed.67 His clearest appeal to Hegel is to be found in the same article, where he emphasizes his spiritual conception of the ‘nieuwe beelding’: ‘The spirit is a thing infinitely higher than nature; in it, divinity manifests itself more than in nature. It must thus be understood, that all works which are wrought according to the spirit, must diverge from the external forms of nature and that they will diverge completely or rather less in the proportion in which the spirit has come to its distinction. This makes it quite clear that works as the ones reproduced here are not to be regarded sensually (materially)’68. The theory of ‘de nieuwe beelding’ is a further development of the theory of ‘the spiritual in art’, partly based on Hegel's precepts.
But there are other parallels and other sources. We have already seen (p. 48) that Van Doesburg draws the attention to the conformity of modern thought and the art of ‘De Stijl’. ‘In the essence of thought three stages can be discerned:
| 1. | pure abstract thought, thought for the sake of thought; |
| 2. | concrete thought, thought for the sake of observation, and |
| 3. | a stage between the two, deformative thought. In pure abstract thought all sensual associative perception (nature) is absent. Its place is taken by the relation of ideas. This can be made visible in an exact (mathematical) figure, as practised in mathematics and as a number. In such figures, the notion, the content of pure thought becomes visible. In this case, where the content of pure presentive thought becomes an image (beelding), there is already a question of plastic (beeldende) contemplation.’69 |
And elsewhere he formulates the same idea as follows: ‘Pure thought, in which no image based on phenomena involved, but where numbers, measurements, relations and abstract line have occupied its place, manifests itself by way of the idea, as reasonableness, in Chinese, Greek and German philosophy, and in the form of beauty, in the neo-plasticism (nieuwe beelding) of our time.’70
These two quotations hint definitely at some form of neo-platonic philosophy that Van Doesburg considers as being closely related to neo-plasticism. When looking back, in 1929, on the activities of ‘De Stijl’, he mentions in a footnote the philosophy of Dr. Schoenmaekers as the source of Mondriaan's terminology: ‘This fundamental idea we expressed by the word “Gestaltung” (beelding) in the sense of creative achievement. The word “Gestaltung” had been revalued; it meant for us the superrational, the a-logical and inexplicable, the depth coming to the surface, the balance of interior and exterior, the spoils of the creative battle we fought against ourselves. A new terminology came into existence (note: Mondriaan's method of expression was based for the greater part on the new philosophy of Dr. Schoenmaekers Plastic mathematics) by means of which we expressed the collective idea, the moving spring of our common action. All art, acoustic or visual, sprang only from one idea: Creation (Gestaltung).’71
Schoenmaekers' philosophy was more than the mere source of Mondriaan's
terminology. It was - probably without Van Doesburg's knowledge - one of the catalysing factors which helped to weld the various tendencies into one distinct form: ‘De Stijl’. This supposition will have to be proved by texts, taken from the two works in which Schoenmaekers set out his doctrines: Het nieuwe wereldbeeld (The new image of the world; published at Bussum in 1915) and Beginselen der beeldende wiskunde (Principles of plastic mathematics; ibid. 1916). But Mondriaan was not necessarily influenced by these particular books, though they are mentioned as being part of ‘De Stijl’ library in De Stijl II, p. 72. Both Mondriaan and Schoenmaekers lived, at the time, in Laren and we have verbal evidence, through the kindness of Mme Milius and of Messrs van der Leck, Slijper and Wils, that Mondriaan and Schoenmaekers saw each other frequently and had long and animated discussions.
What now, was the trend of Dr. Schoenmaekers' philosophy and of his system, which he called ‘positive mysticism’? ‘Positive mysticism’, identical with ‘plastic mathematics’,72 is a neo-platonic system of thought. Its author describes it as follows: ‘Plastic mathematics mean true and methodical thinking from the point of view of the creator. Plastic mathematics mean: continuously to become aware of the creator's passion for manifestation, in order to contemplate his creation with equal circumspection.’73 Positive mysticism teaches the laws of creation thus: ‘We now learn to translate reality in our imagination into constructions which can be controlled by reason, in order to recover these same, constructions later in “given” natural reality, thus penetrating nature by means of plastic vision.’74 Therefore it rejects completely nature's direct appearance: But a mystical insight, and certainly a positive, mystical insight is not concerned with any single fact as such. A positive mystical insight has even to describe a single fact as such as an ‘illusion’.75 Dr. Schoenmaekers' doctrine thus takes a very different stand from modern empiric science, although, as Schoenmaekers always takes care to emphasize, not a contradictory one, but merely on another plane. ‘The perception of the empiricist describes, the contemplation of the positive mystic characterizes.’76 So he arrives at his definition of truth: ‘Truth is: to reduce the relativity of natural facts to the absolute, in order to recover the absolute in natural facts.’ 77 This conception of truth is closely related to the human spirit-the driving force of both Schoenmaekers' and Mondriaan's conception of life: ‘Our human instinct for thought is an instinct, not to be surpressed, for the absolute and for recognition; a conscious or unconscious belief in the absolute, that has to manifest itself in nature.’78 This system of modern, mathematical universalism has its definite views on art as well: ‘Is the expression of positive mysticism foreign to art? Not in the least. In art, it creates what we call, in the strictest sense “style”. Style in art is: the general in spite of the particular. By style, art is integrated in general, cultural life.’79
It is not an accidental fact that Mondriaan, who had realized already in Paris, about 1911, that ‘the appearance of natural things changes, but reality remains constant’,80 felt attracted towards this philosophy. ‘Positive mysticism’ claims that it enables its initiale to penetrate, by contemplation, into the hidden construction of reality. It accepts nature's direct appearance as a mere sym-
bolical truth, as a metaphor: ‘Such a story, revealing a sense, is called a symbolical representation. But the same modern man, who gladly admits the symbolical truth of the Bible and will defend it against partial knowledge of mere facts and against specialized science, knows very little about the symbolical truth of nature. Symbolism is creation (beelding), it is a unity of interior and exterior aspects as, for instance, in a story. But the whole of nature is expressive fact and therefore the whole of nature is symbolical truth, as is the Bible. In plastic mathematics the symbolical truth of nature tends to come to precision.’81 Thus, according to Dr. Schoenmaekers, ‘we want to penetrate nature in such a way that the inner construction of reality is revealed to us.’82
This is exactly the end that Mondriaan saw before him when working in Paris. And Dr. Schoenmaekers' explanation of the relation between the mathematical figure and natural reality must have appealed to him: ‘when we want to recognize some plastic figure in given natural reality, we should not ask first if it bears a resemblance (only representations are a likeness), but if its character coincides with the character of the given reality in nature.’83 For Schoenmaekers, contemplation is a mystical quality of the greatest importance, which reaches the level of an artistic creation: ‘Contemplation is absolutely not a “conclusion” of our intellect, nor a continuation of our understanding, but an entirely new knowledge, a revelation.’84
By these quotations, the close relationship of Dr. Schoenmaekers with the world of Mondriaan's thought has been indicated on general lines. A comparison of some selected quotations, however, will show that the relation is much closer than would at first appear. Schoenmaekers, when considering the relation of the creator and his creation, writes as follows: ‘The unique creative force creates the surface of nature, as it tends to manifest itself’85, and elsewhere: ‘The unlimited unity of cosmic oppositions brings about the cosmos.’86 On the other hand, Vantongerloo writes in De Stijl: ‘Everything we see is the consequence of absolute existence. That is, what appears to our eyes and what we call nature. The consequences of the existence appear in nature under different forms, they have different expressions or physiognomies, different substances. From the absolute existence different natural facts come forth.’87 In his New image of the world Schoenmaekers characterizes the laws of cosmic creation as being of a mathematical order: ‘Nature, as lively and capricious as it may be in its variations, fundamentally always functions with absolute regularity, that is to say in plastic regularity.’88 And Mondriaan, writing about neo-plasticism, says: ‘Neo-plasticism is more mathematical than geometrical, it is exact.’89
Elsewhere, in the same work, Schoenmaekers writes: ‘For Life, as a unity, is, in its deepest impulse, figurative; Life, as a unity, and in its deepest impulse, is built plastically and mathematically.’90 And Mondriaan, in De Stijl, on neo-plasticism: ‘Neo-plasticism (beelding) (......) starts where form and colour are expressed (gebeeld) as a unity in the rectangular plane. By this universal means of expression, the versatility of nature can be reduced to mere plastic expression of definite relations.’90a And in his trialogue on neo-plasticism he answers the
question if indeed neo-plasticism can be justified with regard to nature: ‘If you could see that it presents the essence of everything, you would not have asked this question.’91
Another example: In his retrospective article of 1929, Van Doesburg quotes the ‘equations of Mondriaan: vertical = male = space = statics = harmony; horizontal = female = time = dynamics = melody, etc.’92 By these equations, which could, if necessary, be continued, it is made clear that these most unobtrusive of all means of expression, in spite of their simplicity, are an essential, cosmic and living entity. We shall see, that Mondriaan attaches great importance to these equations as well as to the fact that the two series of notions form a chain of contradictions.
Schoenmaekers, on the other hand, sees the system of contradictions as a most important part of his doctrine: ‘Contraries are always related to one another in a way that can be reduced to the ratio of active and passive; “manhood” and “womanhood” for instance, are contraries, not oppositions.’93 And in his system, he formulates another series of equations, strictly parallel: ‘space = concrete evolution = vertical; time = concrete history = horizontal.’94 And he continues this series of contraries, when writing: ‘The absolute line characterises absolute time (....). The absolute ray characterises absolute space.’95 By means of this series of contraries, he formulates a system of mystical dialectics: ‘Contraries are different parts of the same reality. They are only real in relation to one another. The line is actually line only in relation to the ray. And the ray is actually ray, only in relation to the line. So woman is only woman in relation to man; so man is only man in relation to woman.’96 It is on this mystical and somewhat abstruse system of contraries, that Mondriaan builds up his theory of plastic opposition, one of the cornerstones of his doctrine: ‘Thus we see one idea manifest itself in all expressions of life - this idea has been formulated in logical thought. Long before any new feature had revealed itself in life or in art, logical thought had clearly demonstrated the old truth, that a given thing can only be expressed or known by its contrary. In this truth we find demonstration that the visible, the naturally concrete, cannot be known by the visible (nature), but by its contrary. This implicates, that the image of visible reality can only appeal to the present consciousness of time by way of abstractly-real expression.’97
By his theory of contraries, by his mystical form of dialectics, Schoenmaekers arrives at a system of cosmic law, which seems to have been a forerunner of Mondriaan's theories. We must be permitted to quote several excerpts from his theory: ‘The two fundamental, complete contraries which shape our earth and all that is of the earth, are: the horizontal line of power, that is the course of the earth around the sun and the vertical, profoundly spacial movement of rays that originates in the centre of the sun.’98
These mystical descriptions lead, in Dr. Schoenmaekers' system, to a qualitative - not a functional - difference between vertical and horizontal lines, and to the mystical qualification of their intersection - the cross - as a symbol. ‘Absolute contraries become visible as absolute ray and absolute line’,99 and further: ‘The cross is above everything else a construction of nature's reality,
vaguely suspected for some time, and finally become visible... The more he will meditate about the construction of the cross, the more exactly the mysticist will see reality as a created fact (beelding)’.100 For ray and line, vertical and horizontal movement, in Schoenmaekers' system are cosmic, creative forces, which manifest themselves everywhere, even in the slightest detail. ‘The body is fundamentally visible as a figurative realization (uitbeelding) of the intersection of ray and line.’101
Now, a very similar theory may be found in De Stijl: ‘De Stijl’ - and by preference Mondriaan-considers the opposition of horizontal and vertical movement as the fundamental principle of natural construction; it also stresses the qualitative difference between vertical (ray) and horizontal (line) movement, ‘Impression is movement. It cuts out. It is life. Contemplation goes on. It reposes.’102 Thus Vantongerloo, who, owing to his taste for mathematics may have felt especially attracted to Schoenmaekers' Plastic mathematics, formulates his conception of the content of vertical and horizontal movement. But Mondriaan may also be quoted in this context: ‘Thus the ray (radius), which is an inner fact and therefore invisible, is vertical line in plastic creation.’103
Dr. Schoenmaekers' trends of thought have certainly been stimulating for the constitution of ‘De Stijl’ principles. They do not only coincide with Mondriaan's plastic research, but they mark a decisive point in the development of Mondriaan's - and ‘De Stijl's’ - plastic means of expression.
On the authority of Schoenmaekers' theories, the exclusive predominance of the rectilinear and rectangular principle has, in any case, been facilitated. All the symbolical and qualitative implications find their way into the articles of Mondriaan, whose terminology - as Van Doesburg has noted - is entirely based on Schoenmaekers' work. These implications are obvious in Schoenmaekers' texts - they are rather less apparent in Mondriaan's articles. Schoenmaekers, in one of the decisive passages of his Plastic mathematics characterizes the two movements as follows: ‘Movement in line is continuation, movement in the ray is rising, a rising which simultaneously expands (......). The line “receives” its essence from the ray, it is passive (......), the ray gives, it brings the line into existence, it is active (......). The line is horizontal in essence, the ray is vertical in essence. The horizontal and the vertical are not characterized by direction but by essence (.......). The horizontal is characterized as a line: supple, receding, recumbent, continuous, passive, line. The vertical is characterized by the ray: tight, hard, standing, rising, expanding and active ray. The relation of line and ray is the relation between the external and the internal. It is plastic relationship: the interior ray exteriorises into line, or: line is ray, exteriorised.’104 And by way of these plastic elements in the cosmos, Schoenmaekers builds up his central thesis: the primary importance of the cross, as being the prefiguration of our universe: ‘The figure, which objectivates the conception of a pair of absolute entities of the first order, is that of absolute rectangular construction: the cross. It is the figure that represents ray-and-line, reduced to an absoluteness of the first order.’105 Is it indeed exaggerated to assume, that Mondriaan followed this trend of reasoning, when writing on neo-plasticism: ‘Is it, finally,
as arbitrary, that it abstracted, after having done away with all capriciousness, from curved lines also, and arrived at the most immovable, most definite figuration of equilibrated relations, that is to say the composition of rectangular planes?’106
This parallelism between Schoenmaekers' writings and Mondriaan's theoretic principles might be explained as a mere coincidence. But it can be demonstrated that Schoenmaekers' philosophical system does not only contain a prefiguration of ‘De Stijl's’ linear and spacial principles, but that it even includes certain passages on colourism which show a remarkable connection with the conceptions of ‘De Stijl’: The three principal colours are essentially yellow, blue and red. They are the only colours existing (......). Yellow is the movement of the ray (......). Blue is the contrasting colour to yellow (......). As a colour, blue is the firmament, it is line, horizontality. Red is the mating of yellow and blue (......). Yellow ‘radiates’, blue ‘recedes’ and red ‘floats’.107 This additional evidence excludes the possibility of a mere coinciding of the two theories; we can safely assume that Dr. Schoenmaekers' theories became one of the catalysing facts towards the founding of ‘De Stijl’, one of the facts that account for the change in work of the three painters towards the middle of 1917.
Schoenmaekers as well as the founders of ‘De Stijl’ considers reality as a chain of mutual relations which may be reduced to an absolute figure of intersecting vertical and horizontal movement. Schoenmaekers, when dealing with the positive mysticist's experience of reality, writes: ‘he experiences nothing but ...... relations.’108 And Van Doesburg, as he formulates ‘De Stijl’ painters' approach to reality, says: ‘The artist thinks by way of relations.’109 Mondriaan, in his turn, gives a mere argumentative account of the importance of relations for neo-plasticism, when writing: ‘Equilibrated relations are expressed in nature by position, dimension and value of natural form and colour; in the abstract they manifest themselves by position, dimension and value of straight lines and rectangular planes of colour. In nature we can observe that all relations are dominated by one primordial relation: the relation of one extreme to the other extreme. Abstract representation of relations manifests this primordial relation by the duality of position, in rectangular opposition. This relation of position is the most equilibrated, as it expresses the relation of one extreme to the other in absolute harmony, comprising all other relations. When we come to see these two extremes as a manifestation of the interior and the exterior, we become aware of the fact that in neo-plasticism the link between spirit and life has not been broken-we will come to see that neo-plasticism is no denial of full life; we find that the dualism of mind and matter is reconciled in neo-plasticism.’110 This was one of the aspects of the ultimate outlook of ‘De Stijl’ - and there again it coincides with Schoenmaekers' theories, which aim - as does every trend in mysticism - at the ‘unio mystica’ of spirit and matter.
We have considered, at some length, the relations between Schoenmaekers' theories and the ideology, the principles of ‘De Stijl’. This relation is not only important because it shows a definitive influence of Schoenmaekers' theories
on the principles of ‘De Stijl's’ earliest phase - it also has some bearing on the later development of ‘De Stijl’, more especially as regards the elaboration of Mondriaan's views on neo-plasticism.
The aspect we bear in mind when mentioning Mondriaan's theories in connection with those of Schoenmaekers, is the utopian character of his conception. We do not mean to imply by this that the utopian aspect of Mondriaan's theories has been directly and exclusively derived from Schoenmaekers; there are other, though less distinct sources as well. Mondriaan's thought was influenced by Hegel's philosophy and even more so by Hegel's Dutch follower, Bolland, whom he quotes in various instances (De Stijl I, p. 103). Mondriaan was a member of the Dutch Theosophical Society, where he became acquainted with a philosophy, aiming at a realization of human qualities in a life, detached from everyday routine and practical concern. Last, but not least, he was brought up in an atmosphere of rigorous calvinism, with all the messianic implications derived from the Old Testament. But his contact, in Laren, with Dr. Schoenmaekers is of more importance, because it coincides with the decisive years of his evolution; its importance has been stated by many contemporary witnesses, and it can be traced through Schoenmaekers' and Mondriaan's writings.
In Schoenmaekers' New image of the world, the last chapter deals with redemption. It is there that we find the utopian conclusions of his system: ‘Our deliverance can only come through a plastic force (......). He knows that deliverance is nothing but the dying away of our particular individuality, in order to be resurrected, to rise again as the all-embracing, the plastic personality, the all-human, in God-man.’111 And elsewhere, in the same book, he writes about an unavoidable necessity, about the fact that the creative forces of his theory will create a new world, i.e. the object of his utopian speculations. ‘The positive mysticist knows for certain that this new world is a reality - as he knows with certainty just what the quality of contrasta is and what they are called upon to enact. But he cannot as yet contemplate the beauty of the new world in its unity and its versatility; he can but have a presentiment. And that presentiment is his happiness, his hour of ecstasy (......). We can keep this experience as a certain expectation, that once and somewhere the contrasts, light and sound, shall create a new and everlasting plastic world (beelding) and that they cannot but do so, as they are contraries, cosmic contraries, part of the whole of plastic life of the world. This new plastic expression (nieuwe beelding) is of this world, it is born from light and sound. But it is a new earthliness, an earthly heaven.’112 The astounding feature about this quotation is the fact, that we already find this expression ‘de nieuwe beelding’ in a text by Schoenmaekers, employed in a sense very near to the one, in which Mondriaan is to use it afterwards. It may thus be assumed, that Mondriaan did not only adapt the term ‘de nieuwe beelding’ from Schoenmaekers' writings, but that its content, its meaning and its intricate implication, its positive attitude towards life may also be traced back to the work of Schoenmaekers.
By the fact that such a great deal of Mondriaan's - and ‘De Stijl's’ - concep-
tions can be traced back to Schoenmaekers, we come to see ‘De Stijl’, its origin and its development in a somewhat different light. The origin of ‘De Stijl’ is not only a question of three different tendencies in painting which met and resulted in a new and unprecedented form of abstract art. And then too, ‘De Stijl’ is something else - and more - than the mere result of this coagulation of three separate tendencies of modern painting into a new trend. ‘De Stijl’ has to be considered as a philosophy as well, as a conception of life and of nature, and ‘De Stijl's’ artistic results are to be regarded as the plastic manifestations of this way of thinking.
‘De Stijl’, seen as a philosophy of life, as a vision of nature, apart from his artistic contributions, is Mondriaan's important share in the origin of the group. By adapting Schoenmaekers' theories in the field of painting and plastic arts, he created an opportunity for ‘De Stijl’ to be more than just one of the many other contemporary trends in painting. Both Van Doesburg and Van der Leck were less concerned with the philosophical aspects of ‘De Stijl’; Van Doesburg's main interest was directed towards a new and lively artistic movement as an interpretation of modern life; Van der Leck was chiefly concerned with the creation of an objective language in painting, exclusive of all individual, social or national limitations. It was Mondriaan, who constantly bore in mind the culture of what he called ‘the interior’: man's spiritual and intellectual qualities. He had an enormous confidence in the eventual maturing of these qualities, enabling man to arrive at a new conception of reality and of life by means of contemplation and abstraction. Neo-plasticism, ‘the new movement in plastic art’ (thus Van Doesburg had called his pamphlet) was to be the artistic expression of this ‘matured’ conception of life. We have to keep this idea in mind, when reading Mondriaan's explanation of ‘De Stijl's’ origin: ‘Now we are able to explain, why abstract-real expression (abstract-reële beelding) has not appeared until now. From its appearance we can conclude, that now only equality in the relation between the exterior and the interior, of the natural and the spiritual in man, has come into existence. This new relationship must give birth to a new style.’113 And now the facts which made Mondriaan and his friends believe in a new, more mature age, able to create a novel style, will have to be considered.
The origin of ‘De Stiji’; the circumstances of its time
Mondriaan and his friends firmly believed that their period was a new and decisive one in the evolution of the world: an era, full of promises and possibilities for realizing a better human existence. Only traditional prejudices could still hamper the progress of mankind; the road of progress lay before them, and they had but to tread it: ‘We have seen the new being born: in all arts, it comes to rise, more or less. The old only causes damage in so far as it puts obstacles in the way of the new. It is only with regard to the new, that it does not count any longer. At a given moment, in the past, all the varieties of the old have been
new... but not the new. For let us not forget that we are at a turning point of civilisation, at the end of everything old; the separation between the two is absolute and definite.’114 They hold an almost mystical belief in the achievements of their century: the 19th had laid the foundations by its inventions, by its researches, by the spreading and deepening of science; the 20th was to build on these foundations and to see the completion of the building. The beginning of the century had indeed produced inventions and achievements which seemed to change human conditions to a degree that we now can scarcely conceive: air-planes, telephone, wireless, the recording of sound, new and faster means of locomotion - inventions and achievements which must have, indeed, engendered the belief in a new and brighter future in a generation, witnessing all these innovations. From these facts, the artist developed a new approach towards reality: an optimistic belief in the faculties of human development, a new consciousness of a future which man could achieve by his own means: ‘For the consciousness in the expressions of art is one of the features of the new of today: the artist is no longer the blind instrument of intuition. In a work of art, natural sentiment no longer prevails. It is an expression of spiritual sentiment, that is to say, of the union of reason and sentiment.’115
Of all the members of ‘De Stijl’ it is Oud who most clearly expresses this modern consciousness. His clear-cut view of the decade, its promises and possibilities, is probably due to the fact that, as an architect, he lived in close contact with practical reality, with the actual realization of ideas, that he, by his very profession, was less isolated in an ivory tower of speculative thought. Oud, by his character and profession, is a realist, and the fact of this different attitude is shown clearly in his articles in ‘De Stijl’ and in his other publications. It is shown, still more, in the development of his work. And owing to this faith in the progress of the faculties of the human mind, he could translate the first manifestation of ‘De Stijl's’ ideas into the everyday reality of human life.
In Oud's writings, this confidence in the achievements of modern life stands out clearly: ‘In our present day, people talk a lot about modern ideas; too much, some people say. I cannot entirely agree. “Modern” ideas and facts, the facts and ideas of a period, but - at the same time - conditioned by that period, will at all times deeply move and violently agitate artists during periods of increased artistic effort. I do not believe in an automatism, by means of which - as if by itself - a style comes into existence. Style always suggests spiritual order, that is to say a spiritual volition, even though its intentional character is not always so clear as it is at the beginning of the Renaissance. Nevertheless one can admit that nothing is as relative and as transitory as a “modern” idea, the outer appearance of which is, and has to be, always different, according to its essential instability(......). Individually growing ideas are “modern”, collectively they are “new”.’116
These ideas, which have come into existence by a collective growth, are termed by ‘De Stijl’ as ‘the common consciousness of time’ (het algemeen tijds-bewustzijn), and ‘De Stijl’ attaches great importance to them. ‘Consciousness of the life of a period, and not its formal tradition, is the line of conduct of the
period's art.’117 And this consciousness, in its turn, is conditioned by a number of different features; by the development of science, of technique, of labour, etc.
Van Doesburg, who had always been attracted by the results of science, emphasizes the important effect of science on the growth of this consciousness: ‘Every form of expression in art grows, by necessity, from the period's spirit, and has to be explained by way of this spirit. Style comes into existence, when an equilibrated relation between interior and exterior conditions has been achieved by a common consciousness of life.’118 But this ‘spirit’, this consciousness of life, has to be explained in its turn: ‘Imagine living in a period, where it is generally accepted as a truth that the earth is flat and limited to its four sides. That this plane is immovable, etc. Isn't it obvious that the entire conception of life has to be in agreement with this supposition? And that the entire conception will change at the very moment a scientific experiment shows that the earth is a free, floating body and in constant movement? Thus every notion of God, of time or of space, is directly dependent on scientific experiment’119
This fact - the constant change of the ‘consciousness of time’ is, in its turn, reflected in art: ‘The difference in form (Giotto-Picasso) proceeds from an entirely different relation of humanity to universal life. Our technique, our science, the whole of our culture, create an entirely different conception of the universe than the one manifested by Giotto.’120 And Oud, sharing Van Doesburg's opinion, warns explicitly against an exaggerated appreciation of new forms without taking into account their spiritual sources from the ‘new consciousness of life’: ‘Nothing is more inconvenient to the further development of new architecture than the attraction that the novelty of its dress possesses for superficial talents. Not the new forms are principally important, but the new attitude towards life, from which these forms emerge.’121 And he finds the sources of this new attitude in the more practical realizations of modern life, the innovations which concern his daily activity as an architect: ‘Spirit overcomes nature, mechanical production supersedes animal power, philosophy supplants faith. The stability of the old consciousness of life has been undermined, the natural context of its organs disturbed (......). A new rhythm of life is in a state of genesis, a rhythm in which a new aesthetic energy and a new ideal of forms seem to be marked in broad outlines.’122
What are the features of this new consciousness of life? Mondriaan gives its general description in his first fundamental article in De Stijl. The text starts with a declaration on abstract life: ‘The life of today's cultivated humanity is gradually turning away from natural conditions; it is becoming more and more an abstract life. Where the natural (outer) activity becomes more and more automatic, we see life's attention turn more and more towards interior values.’123 This conception of abstract life is, for Mondriaan, one of the most important basic principles of ‘De Stijl’ and its ideology. in another article in De Stijl he formulates the same conception of a turning point in man's life, of an evolution towards the spiritual values, which. has been made possible by the achievements of the 20th century, and by a new social structure of human life, which was to
come into existence in the near future: ‘With a view to cosmic evolution, we can say: man today develops in the opposite direction, away from matter and towards the spirit (......). The physical condition in general is an expression of spirit as well, though a lower one; but man is certainly a very special being among all existing things; in physical life he comes to a consciousness of self, he therefore exists as selfconsciousness too-next to, or rather in his ordinary life, there is a second life, an abstract life. We have to take this into account, if we want to arrive at a clear notion of art. In order to understand the evolution of art from the natural towards the abstract, we have to understand that man's evolution continues in those physical circumstances as a process of interiorisation.’124
This abstract feature, which Mondriaan detects in modern life, is also a reason for Oud to forecast an equivalent development in art, an evolution towards the abstract: ‘Life and art have acquired in our time another, a more abstract accent. By this fact, there is a livelier contact between the two than one would superficially be inclined to think. It becomes obvious through technique as well as through costume (......). Thus, stress is no more laid upon the sentimental, the opaque, the sensually-pleasant, but on inner sensibility, on clarity, on the spiritual emotion, though these are more difficult to understand for today's complicated humanity. Not the more sensual values, such as tone, ornament, etc., but the more spiritual values such as relations, clear forms and pure colour must become the means of art’125 The entire development of ‘De Stijl’ and of neo-plasticism is therefore based on the evolution of life, of man's attitude towards his environment, and the course of art is the parallel of the line of evolution of life. Not only that it has to be the parallel of this evolution: it must be, in the first place, a plastic expression of the new trends which have left their mark on the surface of contemporary life.
But these new features of modern life, when discerned, will have to be accounted for. What are the sources of this ‘new consciousness of time’, which in its turn had engendered ‘abstract life’? The origin - ‘De Stijl’ artists tell us - lies in the evolution of human society and one of the most important facts that change the face of human society is technique. ‘Life develops and man today uses different means than the man of yesterday. His knowledge of the motor has made him a different being, and he sees life from a different angle. As the organisation of human life has changed by the fact of evolution's progress, art, which is subject to the same law, cannot stand still, but its evolution is slow, for centuries it remained stationary before the means of the old plastic art. The means of yesterday are far removed from our era and from the life we lead.’126 It is Vantongerloo who thus states the need for a renewal in art, as its way of expression no longer agrees with the general features of our time. He uses a charming metaphor to illustrate his ideas: ‘When we use the airplane, the engine will not lose its superb beauty, but its use will be reduced.’127
Life has indeed been changed by technique to a degree that following generations will never sufficiently be able to appreciate. Mechanical production has created new values, not only in its own domain, but in the general consciousness
of humanity: precision, accuracy, neatness are values of a spiritual order, which possibly are not created by technical development, but which owe their general validity in today's society to the spreading of mechanical production. Of all ‘De Stijl’ artists, Oud has most clearly realised this fact: ‘In order to bring about a definite manifestation of the spirit, the means of expression have to be brought to distinctness first; and which of these is more definite and of our time than the machine? (......) For the modern artist, the future conclusions will lead towards the latter, though at present people will still consider this idea an heresy. for it is not only a fact that the machine can produce more accurately than our hand, but it is obvious as well, that from a social, an economic point of view, the machine is the indicated means for the manufacture of products which will be of benefit to a community, more so than the artistic production of today, which only reaches a few rich individuals.’128
This social and artistic conception of technique is indeed a special feature of the first years of this century. It was on technique, that the optimism of an entire generation was concentrated. For the first generation of this century, technique and science were the two pillars of progress. Science and technique had enabled mankind to liberate itself from the limitations of nature and they would lead the way towards a not distant and even more glorious future. Science and technique had broken nature's domination over man and had enabled man, in his turn, to dominate nature. Science had analysed and established the laws of nature; without the knowledge of these laws, man is doomed to impotence. Once in the possession of this knowledge, he owns the means to use these laws against nature itself and to deliver humanity from its dependence on nature. By this knowledge he commands the means to force nature to work for him: technique has been developed out of science. And by technique, man is capable of intervening in the course of nature, to alter its course and to modify it to his advantage. The late 19th- and the early 20th century have seen the first results of technique, the first modifications of nature to man's advantage, and a whole generation has been impressed by these facts and has turned in admiration towards the people who had achieved what might be considered the first manifestations of progress: The St. Gothardt-tunnel, the first airplane, the phonograph and other ‘modern miracles’.
By the results and the first successes of technique an increasing number of people became conscious of the fact, that technique had engendered two new features: a new man, the engineer, and a new language, the abstract formula. The engineer, the technician, became the objects of admiration; in popular opinion they came to take the place, occupied in earlier periods by the ‘virtuoso’, the man of brilliant accomplishments. The language of science and technique, the abstract formula, had a different destiny: its inaccessibility prevented its popular appeal, it became the object of emulation in various other, non-scientific disciplines. Dr. Schoenmaekers' Plastic mathematics is one of the many impressive examples of this phenomenon. The suggestive power of the abstract formula spread widely among the various circles in intellectual Europe and the magical qualities - which it seemed to have had for those who did not
understand its practical meaning-conquered many of the most progressive minds.
This tendency was strongly felt among the artists of ‘De Stijl’ and the theories of Dr. Schoenmaekers' had certainly prepared their minds. But the inclination towards the proceedings of technique and towards its language, were indeed most strongly felt among those, who had an adequate knowledge of science and technique: the architects. ‘The need for number and measure, for purity and order, for regularity and repetition, for perfection and completion - qualities of the organs of modern life, of technique, of traffic, of hygiene, inherent to social structure, to the economic conditions, to the methods of mass production - finds its forerunner in Cubism.’129 It is Oud, who thus expounds the affinity between technique and early 20th century painting. And it is known well enough, that Oud did not express an opinion of his own, but that Cubism - as Futurism - has indeed been inspired by technique, precisely by the aspects quoted by Oud: precision, regularity, purity, etc.
Oud tries to trace the meaning of this inspiration: ‘Technique has arrived at a new plastic expression (gestaltung) because it applied itself without any afterthought to the practical needs of life. From this fact we must not attempt to derive an equalisation of architecture and technique (......). But if there have been any traces of an elementary desire for form, belonging to our time, and being of a collective, and therefore of a new structure, they are to be found in technique. Indeed, technique should not serve as an example to architecture, but it could be a lesson and a stimulus.’130. And some years later, Van Eesteren, another of ‘De Stijl’ architects, follows the same line of reasoning: ‘The artists saw that our period was shapeless, that is to say that it did not find a synthesis for thought and work. But they felt the first traces of such a synthesis in the products of technique, which all rose from an identical way of thinking: technical thought. The engineer and the modern artist had already much in common before they came to know each other. The artists began to consider matter in a different way: they began, in their, compositions of materials to denaturalize matter. The engineer did the same in his constructions.’131
Technical thought, as quoted by Oud and Van Eesteren, was considered to be the dominating trend of thought in the 20th century, as for instance, theological thought had been dominant in the 17th. And it seemed only logical and inescapable, that the century's style should be moulded by the period's predominating trend of thought. ‘In this striving for the removal of all anorganic means, and for an exclusive execution in strictly organic means, in this effort, therefore, from irrelevance to objectivity, the material and spiritual, the practical and aesthetic tendencies of our period may be found. Their average force, which becomes more and more evident as being the result of collective currents, is therefore the line of conduct towards a new style.’132 Oud, who has thus expressed his views on the future of art in general, applies this conviction to his personal discipline: ‘The substitution of handicraft by machinework - a social and economic necessity - begins to assume larger proportions in the building trade. Though at first obstinately kept out of the way by the aesthetes,
the application of the mechanical product is spreading more and more, in spite of all opposition, from the subordinate auxiliary material to the most important parts of the building and it makes its influence felt in the formation.’133
Abstract, technical thought, being considered on account of the triumph of technique, as the predominating trend in early 20th century civilisation, as its ‘average force’, was indeed logically to become the indication of the period's style. And as all its partisans have been so intensely fascinated by its results, it is no wonder that they felt its influence in all the reaches of human life. Mondriaan who - under the influence of Schoenmaekers - considers abstract thought chiefly as a striving for balance, for equilibrated relations, is the first to do so: ‘Abstract life, still remaining real, manifests itself more and more in all directions. The machine relieves more and more natural forces. In fashions we see a typical tightening of form and an interiorisation of colour, both of which are signs of a withdrawal from nature. In the modern dance (step, boston, tango etc.) we see the same tightening: the round line of the old dances (waltz etc.) has made room for the straight line while every movement is immediately neutralized by a counter-movement - a sign of striving for balance.’134 As all the domains of human life showed some kind of manifestation of this new, abstract and technical thought, art, which had always been the first to render visible the general trends of a period, could not remain behind. As there was no other predominating force in the period's consciousness - theology and nationalism being considered as obsolete remains of bygone times - technical and scientific abstraction had to lead the way towards the style of the new era. It is of no importance, that a later generation qualified this attitude as a kind of superstition - it happened to be a generally accepted fact at the time.
So intensely were the artists-and not only they-fascinated by the results of technical thought, that they paid little attention to the social consequences of this trend, and that they almost neglected the direct consequences of technique on their own domain. Oud has some concern for the social aspects of the machineage and Van 't Hoff draws conclusions from a situation which he analyses from the social point of view: ‘The first claim of the new plastic creation of a style, and more specially in architecture, is to acquire complete knowledge of the present social and economic conditions, both of the materials and of their manufacture. Architecture is not only concerned with the claims of the principal, but with the demands of the workers as well. As to the latter, we should no longer think that building is a compulsory or a forced labour. A building should be logically and purely planned, the project should be based on the possibility of quick and practical execution. Everything should be reasonable and intelligible, so that the manner of working rather shortens than lengthens the day. We demand a maximum of labour from the machine, a minimum from the workman who should not be in the least concerned about the personal feelings of the designer.’135 This feature of the modern way of production - though barely mentioned in De Stijl's writings - is yet of great importance to the development of its conceptions. It accounts, to a great extent, for the anti-individualistic tendencies of the group. As production was, in the 20th century
civilisation no more the affair of the individual, or of a workshop directed by an individual, where the division of labour had split up the process of production into a designing and an executing section, the imprint of the individual and his personal feelings were considered as being out of date. All kinds of features in which the individual feelings of the designer were reflected, could only be realized and were therefore justifiable if the execution was laid in the hands of the same person as the designing. This method being no longer practicable - as the execution was entrusted to an anonymous group of persons-the individual features of design were consequently limited. A truly modern style could only base its reasons of existence on the actual methods of production, such as the division of labour. This principle was not only considered valid for architecture, but for the other plastic arts as well, for a budding style was not to be dependent on the accidental circumstances of a single branch of art, but should depend from the facts generally prevailing in the whole of civilisation. Therefore, the anti-individualistic principles were applied to painting and sculpture as well, stipulating an execution devoid of individualistic features.
It is a remarkable fact, that the artists of ‘De Stijl’ gave so little attention to the repercussions of technical innovations on painting itself, though this fact can be regarded as one of the important sources of abstract art. Mondriaan, when writing on the technical inventions in the field of music, mentions the fact in a rather casual way: ‘As the invention of photography has delivered the death-blow (as André Breton puts it) to the old way of expression, we hail the invention of the “bruitistes” as a new one’136 Indeed, the invention of photography has been as revolutionary a fact in the domain of the plastic arts and of painting in the first place, as, for instance, the invention of the steam-engine had been in the field of production, or the invention of the airplane in that of transport. An important part of pictorial tradition had thereby been transferred from the realm of art to that of technique: the art of portraiture, the documentary part of painting, was no longer exclusively in the hands of the painter. The removal of this, hitherto so important function of painting, effected, necessarily, the transformation of the remainder. The value of the likeness, of coincidence with the object, became - from one of the important features of painting - a quality which was, at best superfluous, if not unworthy Indeed, photography, would do as well, if not better. There is a typical sentence of Bonset (Van Doesburg) on this subject: ‘Portrait painters: solicitors' souls. The drawing up of an accurate likeness of a face by means of colour, has no more artistic value than a notarial act has literary value.’137 The scale of values had therefore to be re-established and the highest place was allotted to values, not depending on the objects represented, but originating from the artists' creative qualities, such as composition, harmony, balance etc. These values were traced in the works of the old masters (Vantongerloo, L'Art et son Avenir, pp. 51, 59, pl. 17 sq.) and stressed in contemporary works. The rise and the growing importance of what Kandinsky has termed ‘the spiritual in art’ is indeed, to an important degree, a consequence of the invention of photography, which has revolutionised the entire art of painting. Its consequences on a different level -
the creation of an aesthetic theory - have to be examined elsewhere in this study.
The dialectic influence of the invention of photography on plastic art can only be examined here, in as far as it has bearing on the evolution of ‘De Stijl’, although it is, generally speaking, one of the primary reasons for the growth of abstract art. But there is still another document of ‘De Stijl’ dealing with photography from a different point of view: ‘The enormous enlargement by way of the lens, in projection, betrays every weakness of the human hand; but as it is no more the hand but the spirit, that produces art and as the new spirit demands the greatest possible precision for its expression, it is only the machine in its utter perfection, the modern machinery, that is able to realize the highest claims of creative spirit.’138 There is a document - among Van Doesburg's writings - which not only connects photography with the rise of abstract art, but with the more specific claims of ‘De Stijl’: precision, mechanical accuracy. What is here called the ‘weakness of the hand’ is practically the same as what ‘De Stijl’ artist elsewhere calls the ‘caprice of nature’, to which they oppose the constant and imperturbable precision of straight lines and right angles. In their rectilinear and rectangular system they have indeed reached a precision, an accuracy, which can compete with that of a machine - though it may bejust that very lack of precision, that ‘weakness of the hand’, and the individual features, which characterize some of their works as the masterpieces they happen to be. But as to their aim, it was mechanical precision that was their concern and they claimed it as a necessary means of expression