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Week 9 - Dutch De Stijl

Holland, like much of Europe, was a bit of a mess after WWI. In response to the environment of chaos came a Movement where order was valued above all else. Although De Stijl was a small, close-knit group, they had a widespread effect on art and design. Sadly though, it all ended in tears. The prime figures, Mondrian and van Doesburg, had a falling out over the contentious issues of diagonal lines and use of the colour green.
Google.com image search for De Stijl
Google Directory - Art Movement - De Stijl
the-artfile.com/uk/styles/stijl/stijl.htm
qdesign.co.nz/designhist_destijl.html
the-artists.org/MovementView.cfm?id=8A01EE8F%2
DBBCF%2D11D4%2DA93500D0B7069B40

archinform.net/stich/219.htm?ID=6d382c1659f5a6913bd02df8cb76e5d7
artsmia.org/modernism/nLetter.html
hud.ac.uk/schools/library/hip/design/lecture/destijl.html

Theo van Doesburg (1883-1931)

Painter, poet and art critic who established the De Stijl magazine, from which the Movement took it's name.

The magazine ran 1917-32.
guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_bio_157.html

Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) also spelled Piet Mondriaan

One of the main founders of the De Stijl Movement. He called his style Neo-Plasticism. He was the long-term purist of the movement, although even he finally broke the formula after moving to New York and developing a taste for jazz. He went to the extreme of making paintings WITHOUT black lines *gasp* such as the famous "Broadway Boogie-Woogie": webexhibits.org/colorart/mondrian2.html
ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/mondrian
artchive.com/artchive/M/mondrian.html
guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_bio_112.html
This is fun:
www.ptank.com/mondrian

J.J.P. (Pieter or Pietr) Oud (1890 -1963)

Jacobus Johannes Pieter Oud, architect and one of the founding members of the De Stijl movement. He left the group due to philosophical differences and went on to become one of Holland's premier Modernist architects.
greatbuildings.com/architects/J._J._P._Oud.html

Gerrit Rietveld (1888 ­ 1964)

Furniture designer Rietveld produced the famous Red & Blue Chair in 1918. The De Stijl founders were so impressed by this piece that they invited him to join them, and became the foundation for their distinctive designs.
centraalmuseum.nl/rietveld/index.php?lingo=UK
greatbuildings.com/buildings/Schroder_House.html
cassinausa.com/rietveld.html
roland-collection.com/rolandcollection/section/34/502B.htm

r20thcentury.com/bios/designer.cfm?article_id=85
modernclassics.com/rietveld.htm
galinsky.com/buildings/schroder

Italian Futurism

Futurism may look a lot like other European Modernist Movements but there's a darker side. The Manifestos on which the movement is based are often violent, intense and anti-social. Exponents came from both extremes of the political spectrum - fascists and revolutionary leftists.Google.com image search for Futurism
Google Directory - Art Movements - Futurism
artchive.com/artchive/futurism.html

FT Marinetti wrote the first Futurist Manifesto in 1909.
futurism.org.uk/marinetti/mar_frames.htm
unknown.nu/futurism

Umberto Boccioni was one of the prime artists of the Italian Futurist movement.
artchive.com/artchive/B/boccioni.html

The predominant form of Applied Art / Design undertaken by the Futurists was architecture. Antonio Sant'Elia even wrote a manifesto about it. My, those Futurists were a bunch of angry young men. They mostly died in WWI, somewhat ironically killed by the very machines, violence and anarchy they so glorified.
futurism.org.uk/architecture/architecture.htm
unknown.nu/futurism/architecture.html

Another Futurist Architect was Nicolay Diulgheroff who designed the very Art-Deco looking Mazzotti House. Unfortunately, the best website featuring this house is in Italian. Considering that the house is in Italy, I guess that's no great surprise. www.tulliodalbisola.it/casa_mazzotti You can try a pretty bad automatic English translation.

Contextual factors to consider:

  • WWI had a huge impact in Europe. So many soldiers died that there was hardly a family in Europe who had not lost someone. This was the machine age - but those machines had caused much devastation in the war. The confidence of the old empires was dented, nostalgia was replaced with a desire for a new, different future.

Some key technical innovations:

  • New materials and processes were developed - plastics, metal alloys, plywood.

Meanwhile, in Fine Art:

  • Expressionism evolves into Dada and Surrealism
  • Cubism evolves into Suprematism, Constructivism, De Stijl, Futurism and Bauhaus
  • Modernism is also used as a Fine Art term, including all of the above.
retrokat.com quite nice sites

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