Serigraph

Magnificent Minimalism

Serigraph was created by Piet Mondrian around 1935. This simple yet striking composition clearly shows the harmony and balance that Mondrian strived for in his work. To fully appreciate this particular piece, it is useful to understand how Mondrian's artistic style developed over time.

Mondrian's early works were influenced by the post-impressionist paintings which explored nature. Over time he introduced more geometric and abstract shapes into his pictures. He started to include more dark lines and an increasing sense of structure began to emerge. His images finally became fully non-representational and featured grids, lines and squares of colours.

Eventually he began to use only the primary colours of red, blue and yellow. Mondrian would experiment with the size and length of the lines. He then began to use greater amounts of white space until he reached the point here, in this image, whereby the only colour used is the striking blue, carefully contained within the black grid.

Mondrian termed this style of painting as neo-plasticism. He felt that this strong, asymmetric style which shows bold colour matching bold straight lines, was harmonious. It was during this period that his work was probably at its most minimalistic.

By the time he painted his last piece, Broadway Boogie-Woogie (1942-43), his neo-plastic style had come full circle as the black grid lines had disappeared and the canvas was filled with colour.

Mondrian was also a founder member of the De Stijl Movement (The Style). Their simplified style of art and pure abstraction was partly a reaction to the war and also to the Art Deco style at the time. Their aim was to achieve a spiritual harmony through arts.

This magnificent yet minimalistic piece illustrates "The Style" that Mondrian hoped to achieve perfectly.