Neo-Plasticism

Fast Facts

Feeling that Analytical Cubism did not go far enough, did not represent pure
reality, Mondrian developed Neo-Plasticism (1917-1928). His new style reflected
the desire for standardization in the contemporary machine age. Its precision and
purity were perfect for the “new man” in Utopian society. Mondrian worked in
artistic solitude.

*** Mondrian believed that abstraction was intellectually pure and “natural” and
that linear, vertical and horizontal arrangements were inherently harmonious.

Term adopted by the Dutch pioneer of abstract art, Mondrian, for his own type of
abstract painting. From Dutch de nieuwe beelding. Basically means new art (painting and
sculpture are plastic arts). Also applied to the work of De Stijl circle of artists, at least up
to Mondrian's secession from the group in 1923.

"Art should not concern itself with reproducing images of real objects, but only express
the universal absolutes that underlie reality." Piet Mondrian

Artists by Movement:
Abstract Expressionism

Centered in New York City, 1946 to 1960's

Abstract Expressionism is a type of art in which the artist expresses himself

purely through the use of form and color. It non-representational, or non-
objective, art, which means that there are no actual objects represented.

Now considered to be the first American artistic movement of international

importance, the term was originally used to describe the work of Willem de
Kooning, Jackson Pollock and Arshile Gorky.

The movement can be more or less divided into two groups: Action Painting,
typified by artists such as Pollock, de Kooning, Franz Kline, and Philip Guston,
stressed the physical action involved in painting; Color Field Painting, practiced
by Mark Rothko and Kenneth Noland, among others, was primarily concerned
with exploring the effects of pure color on a canvas.
Timeline: Abstract Expressionism

On the floor I am more at ease, I feel nearer, more a part of the painting, since this way I
can walk around in it, work from the four sides and be literally `in' the painting.
-- Jackson Pollock, 1947.

Pollock, Jackson (1912-56). American painter, the commanding figure of the Abstract
Expressionist movement.

He began to study painting in 1929 at the Art Students' League, New York, under the
Regionalist painter Thomas Hart Benton. During the 1930s he worked in the manner of
the Regionalists, being influenced also by the Mexican muralist painters (Orozco, Rivera,
Siqueiros) and by certain aspects of Surrealism. From 1938 to 1942 he worked for the
Federal Art Project. By the mid 1940s he was painting in a completely abstract manner,
and the `drip and splash' style for which he is best known emerged with some abruptness
in 1947. Instead of using the traditional easel he affixed his canvas to the floor or the wall
and poured and dripped his paint from a can; instead of using brushes he manipulated it
with `sticks, trowels or knives' (to use his own words), sometimes obtaining a heavy
impasto by an admixture of `sand, broken glass or other foreign matter'. This manner of
Action painting had in common with Surrealist theories of automatism that it was
supposed by artists and critics alike to result in a direct expression or revelation of the
unconscious moods of the artist.

Pollock's name is also associated with the introduction of the All-over style of painting
which avoids any points of emphasis or identifiable parts within the whole canvas and
therefore abandons the traditional idea of composition in terms of relations among parts.
The design of his painting had no relation to the shape or size of the canvas -- indeed in
the finished work the canvas was sometimes docked or trimmed to suit the image. All
these characteristics were important for the new American painting which matured in the
late 1940s and early 1950s.

Mark Rothko in his West 53rd Street studio, c. 1953, photograph by Henry Elkan,
courtesy Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Rudi Blesh Papers

One of the preeminent artists of his generation, Mark Rothko is closely identified with
the New York School, a circle of painters that emerged during the 1940s as a new
collective voice in American art. During a career that spanned five decades, he created a
new and impassioned form of abstract painting. Rothko's work is characterized by
rigorous attention to formal elements such as color, shape, balance, depth, composition,
and scale; yet, he refused to consider his paintings solely in these terms. He explained: It
is a widely accepted notion among painters that it does not matter what one paints as
long as it is well painted. This is the essence of academicism. There is no such thing as
good painting about nothing.
By 1949 Rothko had introduced a compositional format that he would continue to
develop throughout his career. Comprised of several vertically aligned rectangular forms
set within a colored field, Rothko's "image" lent itself to a remarkable diversity of
appearances. In these works, large scale, open structure and thin layers of color combine
to convey the impression of a shallow pictorial space. Color, for which Rothko's work is
perhaps most celebrated, here attains an unprecedented luminosity. His classic paintings
of the 1950s are characterized by expanding dimensions and an increasingly simplified
use of form, brilliant hues, and broad, thin washes of color. In his large floating
rectangles of color, which seem to engulf the spectator, he explored with a rare mastery of
nuance the expressive potential of color contrasts and modulations.

Piet Mondrian: Oeuvre

The 20th century is distinguished in art history for one invention above all: abstraction.
The Dutch artist Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) was a pioneer in this development. His
reputation rests on about 250 abstract paintings dating from 1917 to 1944, a modest
number for over 25 years of work. Each painting was worked and reworked, built layer
by layer toward an equilibrium of form, color, and surface.

Mondrian named his style "neoplasticism." That is how he translated his own Dutch
phrase nieuwe beelding, which also means "new form" or "new image." The style was
based, he explained, on an absolute harmony of straight lines and pure colors underlying
the visible world.

By expressing this harmony, the painter could herald a utopia where the fine arts would
no longer be needed because life itself would be beautiful. Mondrian took a step in this
direction by arranging rectangles of primary color around his studio walls starting in
1919.

Mondrian believed that the rhythms of urban life — of traffic, buildings, fashion, jazz,
and dance — also foretold the neoplastic utopia. He lived in Paris (1919-1938), London
(1938-1940) and New York (1940-1944), searching each metropolis for evidence of the
harmony that he tried to manifest in painting. Throughout his career, which spanned the
world wars, he believed that art could redeem tragedy. "If we cannot free ourselves," he
wrote in 1941, "we can free our vision."

Early Years: 1872-1907

I began to paint at an early age . . . . I was always a realist.

Mondrian did not find his identity as an abstract painter easily. At fourteen he began
studying drawing under the guidance of his father, an amateur artist who ran a Calvinist
school. He moved to Amsterdam to study full-time in the official art school, the
Rijksacademie, in 1892-1894.
Swimming Beach by Parokya ni Edgar
Tayo na nga
Sino pa ba ang hinihintay natin dito
Naiinip na ako
Sige na nga
Apakan mo na ang silinyador ng oto mo
Iwanan na natin ang mundo
Tayo na sa beach
Tayo na't mag swimming
Bilisan mo na
Gusto ko na magsunbathing
Time to relax
Time to go slow
Makinig kay pareng bob
At sasabihin nito
Pagsapit ng dilim
Lumalamig ang hangin
Sindihan mo na
Ang bonfire natin
Time to relax
Time to go slow
Maupo ka na lang
At panoorin ang mundo
Kalimutan muna ntin ang trabaho
Masisira na ang ating ulo
Kailan ka ba naman huling tumambay
Patapusin ang walang hanggang
paghihintay
Kailan pa by Parokya ni Edgar
Bakit tuwing ikaw ay nakikita
Lumulundag ang aking puso
Kapag ang tinig mo nama'y naririnig
tahimik ang buong daigdig
II
Bawat gabi mag isa akong nagiisip
sana ay kapiling ka
Balak ko sanay sabihin ko na
ang aking na darama
Chorus:
Kailan pa...ito magagawa
kailan pagbibigyan ng tadhana
Bukas ba... o sa makalawa
kung hinding-hindi ngayon
Kailan pa...
III
Minsan tayo'y na iwan
walang ibang kasama
ngunit ng ikaw ay kaharap ko na
di ko masabing mahal kita
(Repeat Chorus)
Iwanan Mo Na Siya by Parokya ni Edgar
Hindi mo ba alam?
Na kriminal yang boyfriend mo
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Baka naman nagshashabu
Mabuti pa ipakulong na natin
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Kaya siguro siya mayaman
Wag ka sanang maniwala sa mga katulad
nya
Di ka dapat magtiwala at iwanan mo na sya
Sapagkat mahal kita
At walang ibang magagawa
Kundi sirain ang pangalan nya.sinta
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