Originally published in the journal Art
Criticism, 1999
The current ascendancy of the
postmodernist viewpoint has led to interpretations of modernism which, to the
present writer, are misguided and misleading.
Nowhere has the critical process been more unfortunately oversimplified
than in the case of Piet Mondrian, one of the key figures of what can be called
"classic" modernism. The
artist/theoretician who strove so intensely to overcome the limitations of late
Romantic subjectivism has been painted as himself a Romantic idealist, a purist
seeker after "essence" who turned his back on reality to pursue an
esthetic of "significant form" as model for a super-Platonic,
essentially totalitarian, Utopia. This
assessment is of course fully in line with the currently fashionable notion of
modernism as an elitist fantasy of mastery and control.
I will attempt, in these pages, to
correct the currently accepted view, not by confronting, as I have elsewhere,[1]
what I regard as the bad faith of the postmodernist critique of modernism, but,
in a less argumentative, more methodical spirit, doggedly retracing and
re-examining the development of this remarkably complex artist and
thinker. Central to my position is the
notion that Mondrian's work, all his work, is characterized by a powerful
commitment to the spirit of realism (not
abstraction) coupled with a prophetic awareness of the problems posed by what
today would be called the "ideology" of the representational
process. Ultimately, I hope to
demonstrate, in the face of the accepted wisdom of the time, that Mondrian's
modernism is an achievement to this day still new and little understood.
I should add that my approach is
informed by a theoretical position I have outlined in another publication,[2] a
position which in turn owes a great deal to the work and thought, as I have
understood it, of the subject of this essay.
No prior knowledge of my theory is expected of the reader in what
follows.
A. The Essence
of Disruption
For me, a major problem with the
postmodernist view generally stems from a difficulty over the notion of
"essence." Clearly Mondrian,
throughout his mature existence and with every fibre of his being, as both
artist and thinker, pursued "essence." What makes him so utterly remarkable,
however, is the very special and totally original nature of the
"essence" he discovered during the course of this pursuit. To fully grasp the special nature of this
extraordinary achievement and its meaning for our understanding and
appreciation of modernism generally, we will need to loosen ourselves as much
as possible from both postmodernist and
modernist dogma to re-examine certain crucial aspects of his artistic
development and rethink the meaning of some of his all too easily misconstrued
theoretical writings.
The Tree Series
Mondrian's
earliest paintings, dating from the 1890's, fuse a stark but conventional
naturalism with the Dutch landscape tradition.
From 1900 through 1907, his work reveals various influences, ranging
from Van Gogh and Gauguin to Edward Munch and the Fauves. 1908 is generally regarded as a turning point
in his career, the beginning of a systematic development that was to continue
till his death in 1944.
The crucial early stages of this
development can be traced through a remarkable series of paintings involving an
obsessive image: a solitary tree. This
series has already, of course, gained attention for its apparently systematic,
almost seamless progression from realism to abstraction. More to our point, in the present context, is
the way Mondrian has here also left an extended meditation on the iconographic
sign.
The series begins in 1909 with some rather
conventionally naturalistic studies of a particular, carefully observed, tree,
its trunk leaning heavily to the right. These lead to the highly
expressionistic Red Tree,[3]
very much in the spirit of Van Gogh, but with even more intensified color.
The tree is
red striated with blue, on a blue background.
Barren of leaves, the intricate network of branches stands out against
the background as a dense interplay of expressively curving lines. Three more "portraits" of the same
tree, dating from 1909-10, are progressively more simplified and expressively
symbolic. The culminating work, called
the Blue Tree, is a highly
schematized dark silhouette with branches radiating out from the center.
This design,
combined with the intensity of the color, gives the tree a flamelike
aspect. The overall effect is highly
symbolic, as though the tree were being fragmented and consumed by its own life
force.
In semiotic terms, this early sequence
progressively fragments and schematizes the lower level articulations
(signifying the highly individualized branches) in such a way that every
element ultimately becomes totally subordinate, on the highest level, to a
single, dominant, paradigm (the tree as a whole). Exhibiting techniques already common in
Symbolist pictorialism, a painting like The
Blue Tree thus disrupts iconographic realism only for the purpose of
dramatizing and intensifying a "higher" meaning.
If we define the icon as "the
sign which resembles," we must note how this sequence moves progressively
from a true iconism (embodied in the initial, "naturalistic" attempts
to render the tree in its unique individuality) to a largely conventional
symbolism in which the tree becomes a universalized emblem, not many steps
removed from the arbitrariness of the linguistic signifier.
When Mondrian first saw Cubist
paintings, probably in 1911,[4]
their reductivist, analytic fragmentations undoubtedly reminded him of his own
efforts in a similar direction. Unlike
the Futurists, however, who also must have discovered Cubism in 1911, the Dutch
artist clearly sensed that the profoundly disruptive Cubist approach was as
much a rejection of symbolist rhetoric as photographic naturalism. That this insight was decisive is essential
to an understanding of his mature work.
It is not until the next sequence of trees, unmistakably reflecting
Cubist influence, that Mondrian sets out with real authority on the path that
will be his consistently from then on.
For example, the painting known as The Gray Tree,[5]
from 1911, seems poised midway between the schematized symbolism of the earlier
expressionistic works and the analytic disjunctions of Cubism.
Unlike the Blue Tree, systematically fragmented
according to a controlling scheme, The
Gray Tree is fragmented through a studied but decidedly unsystematic
process of give and take, based on idiosyncracies of the subject itself. While it might sound like Mondrian is
returning to the naturalistic iconism of the earliest tree paintings, a single
glance at The Gray Tree reveals a
totally different approach on the syntagmatic
level, i.e., treatment of "space."
The earlier works clearly set the tree off from its background in a
striking figure-ground relation -- The
Gray Tree subjects both tree and background to a thorough fragmentation in
which many figure-ground distinctions are lost in webs of Cubistic facetting
and passage.
The controlling forces of the earlier
paintings are strongly centric, a property emphasized with each progressive
simplification to the point that The Blue
Tree presents an unmistakably geometrical gestalt. The
Gray Tree, with its strikingly arcing central trunk and umbrella of middle
branches, seems torn between a similarly centric force field and the disruptive
effects of Cubist facetting and passage, fusing figure and ground, liberating
most of the lines from their sign-function as branches and their consequent
attachment to the trunk. While this work
can still be "read" as a tree, no really coherent gestalt
unambiguously presents itself.
Thus from the Gray Tree onward Mondrian's methodical analysis of the image
reverses itself. He is no longer
interested in the kind of quasi linguistic fragmentations that lead to
hierarchies through synthesis toward ever higher levels of meaning. On the contrary, he now begins his years-long
search for the kind of structure that will exactly not sacrifice the
idiosyncratic part to the meaningful whole.
This is the only explanation for the enormously cluttered, even ungainly
tree paintings of the final phase (1912-13),[6]
works whose agglomerations of untamed detail could only be derived from an
effort to interrelate the multiple contingencies of raw observation in a manner
free from any controlling scheme, iconographic language, even
"esthetic" criterion. These
highly disjunctive paintings, in which the tree image is literally pulled to
pieces, reach an extreme of close observation and visual analysis rivalling the
most hermetic examples of late analytic Cubism.
Reduction and Resolution
From 1913 onward, following the
example of synthetic Cubism, Mondrian begins to resolve his surfaces. Complex, tentative, linear interlockings,
tentatively adjusted and linked by webs of passage, become relatively simple,
precisely and forcefully defined relationships.
Horizontal and vertical lines which remained light and open begin to
thicken and link, trapping rectangular planes within.
By 1918, with Composition With Gray and Light Brown,[7]
Mondrian has arrived at the format that will pervade his work until the early
Forties, an open, clearly articulated surface, giving the impression of order
while, at the same time, lacking any sort of predictable or definable pattern,
determined exclusively by intersecting thick horizontal and vertical lines and
the rectangles enclosed by them.
In this and
subsequent works, Mondrian has most definitely not, as has been so readily assumed, abandoned a perceptual process
in favor of a purely formal one, in the idealistic pursuit of "significant
form," but has in fact only intensified
his ongoing search for the universal principle behind the Cubist obsession with
contingency. In his realization that
such a principle, a universal basis for the disruption of the universal itself,
might exist, he goes beyond Cubism, beyond abstraction, beyond semiotics, into
completely fresh territory.[8]
According to Mondrian, "Cubism
did not accept the logical consequences of its own discoveries; it was not
developing abstraction toward its ultimate goal, the expression of pure
reality."[9] Having thoroughly disassembled it, robbed it
of its signifying power and turned it into a simple design element, the Cubists
remained fascinated by the visual sign.
Indeed, the witty interplay of abstraction and defused iconographic
signification is an important aspect of synthetic Cubism. Mondrian, on the other hand, clearly saw no
point in continuing to dwell on the sign, a now superfluous remnant of a
decoded, demystified naturalism. It was
the reality veiled by both natural appearances and semiotic codes, an ultimate truth
released for the first time by the same forces that defeat signification, which he wanted to confront.
Mondrian
As Theoretician
Mondrian's
notion of an apparently transcendent "pure reality" is one of the
truly elusive artifacts in the history of verbalization about art, seeming, as
with so many fundamental concepts, to partake equally of the naive and
profound. While Mondrian was by no means
as gifted a writer as he was a painter, he left an impressive body of
theoretical writings which are both meaningful and consistent, if not always totally
coherent. It is to these writings that
we must turn if we wish to understand what he regarded as the "logical
consequences" of Cubism.
Before we proceed, however, a word of
explanation is necessary. Fortunately,
Mondrian was a genuine thinker whose researches have produced theoretical works
of enormous value. Unfortunately,
Mondrian's ideas are new and complex and his dense, awkward literary style,
sometimes verbose and repetitive, sometimes maddeningly laconic, can be
extremely confusing. Moreover, there is
apparently no one place where his overall position is presented as a continuous
argument -- vital aspects of his theoretical framework are spread out in
numerous articles written over a period of more than forty years. Thus, while it would of course seem virtually
impossible to "speak for" Mondrian with absolute authority, some sort
of attempt to organize and clarify his thoughts is necessary if we are to come
to grips with his radically new message.
The strategy adopted here will be to
carefully pick and choose among various key quotations which in my view contain
the gist of Mondrian's theoretical viewpoint.
These statements will be presented in the form of a coherent step by
step argument, punctuated by a certain amount of paraphrase and explanation.[10] What follows, a dogged (and admittedly
somewhat presumptuous) effort to construct a coherent theory out of fragments,
is the sort of thing that must at least be attempted if our understanding of
Mondrian (and modernism generally) is to be rescued from decades of confusion
and half truth.
A
Dialectic of Form and Space
Nature
reveals forms in space[11] .
. . [yet] forms are part of space and . . . the space between them appears as
form, a fact which evidences the unity of form and space . . .[12] Actually
all is space, form as well as what we see as empty space . . . 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 . . .[13]
Mondrian is speaking generally of the
way objects differentiate themselves from the space surrounding them. Objects are perceived as forms (figures or
gestalts) in space (the ground). Under
certain conditions the space between objects (negative space) appears as a form
also, indicating an underlying unity which permits the statement "all is
space." Ultimately form may be
regarded as "limited space."
While the limitation of forms could be
regarded as a drawback (literally a "limitation"), forms gain
concreteness by being limited in a particular way (determined). Space is unlimited but also undetermined,
thus insubstantial. The task of art must
be to determine space and at the same time reveal (create) the equivalence of
space and form. The implied goal is a
space which is both determined (concrete) and unlimited.
The more
neutral the plastic means are, the more the unchangeable expression of reality
can be established. We can consider all
forms relatively neutral that do not show any relationship with the natural
aspect of things or with any "idea."
Abstract forms or dislocated parts of forms can be relatively neutral.[14]
The plastic
relations which the artist must use in determining forms or space are veiled in
the attempt to render natural appearance.
In order to bring such relations forward, the "natural aspect"
must be neutralized. This involves a
process of simplification, reduction and abstraction leading to "flat,
rectilinear" forms free from external reference. Note that in defining the
"neutral," Mondrian rejects not only natural appearance but also
"any 'idea.'" He has turned
his back on both conventional realism and
symbolism.
[I]t is a
great mistake to believe that one is practicing non-figurative art by merely
achieving neutral forms or free lines and determinate relations. For in composing these forms one runs the
risk of a figurative creation, that is to say, one or more particular forms. .
.[15]
[I]n
relation to the environment, simple forms show a static balance. They appear as entities separated from the
whole. In order to establish universal
unity, their proper unity has to be destroyed: their particular expression has
to be annihilated . . .[16]
After one has neutralized the natural
aspect of objects and transformed them into abstract forms, one is still faced
with the problem that even the most abstract forms are still perceived
statically as forms (or gestalts)
within an enclosing space. The
equivalence of form and space will remain unexpressed unless we go beyond
neutralization to break up the forms themselves.
Clearly, for
Mondrian, abstraction in itself is not enough.
Note also that he invokes two very different kinds of unity: the "proper unity" of the
individual form (and, by extension, the usual type of "unifying"
structure that promotes it) is opposed by a completely new kind of
"universal" unity that requires the annihilation of the individual form.
In plastic
art, the static balance has to be transformed into the dynamic equilibrium
which the universe reveals. .[17]
Non-figurative art is created by establishing a dynamic rhythm of determinate mutual relations which excludes the
formation of any particular form . . .[18]
[Static
balance] maintains the individual unity
of particular forms, single or in plurality.
[Dynamic equilibrium] is the unification of forms or elements of forms
through continuous opposition. The first
is limitation, the second is extension.
Inevitably dynamic equilibrium destroys static balance . . .[19]
The particular forms, static, limited,
must be destroyed through a dynamic process of mutual opposition, which breaks
them up and, in so doing, opens them to the enclosing space which is also established
in the same process. This process
Mondrian calls "dynamic equilibrium."
The
equilibrium that neutralizes and annihilates the plastic means is achieved
through the proportions within which the plastic means are placed and which
create the living rhythm.[20]
Having neutralized and opened form,
reducing all elements to a rectilinear opposition of lines and planes, all
creative activity centers on the one element as yet undetermined, the plastic
relations themselves, which must be made concrete (determined) by specific
proportions. For Mondrian, the
proportions must create that living rhythm which is the essence of dynamic
equilibrium.
It is only
after a long culture that within the plastic expression of the limiting form,
one perceives another plastic expression closely allied with it, but, at the
same time, opposed to it. Art
today. .
. has succeeded in establishing
this plastic expression: it is the clear realization of liberated and
universal rhythm distorted and hidden in the individual rhythm of the limiting
form.[21]
The proportions (rhythms) which
annihilate the plastic means, open limited form and make space concrete by
determining it precisely, have their ultimate source in the same contingencies
("individual rhythms") which give rise to the particular, limiting
form in the first place. Thus dynamic equilibrium, while in one sense
destroying the particular, in another, far more significant, sense preserves it
by liberating its vital principle, usually veiled by natural appearance and
limited form. In a sense dynamic
equilibrium is this principle, the
equivalence of space and form, the universal which resides in the particular.
Far from
ignoring our individual nature, far from losing "the human note" in
the work of art, pure plastic art is the union of the individual with the
universal. For liberated rhythm is
composed of these two aspects of life in equivalence.[22]
Two
Spatial Realms
I have
deliberately arranged the above in such a way as to bring out as clearly as
possible the process I find essential to the "formalistic" part of
Mondrian's theory (his treatment of broader issues will be considered
below). Its crucial moments can be
summarized as follows: 1. neutralization
of the image through abstraction; 2. the opening out of (abstract) form; 3.
proportional determination of the (opened) spatial field. While apparently a threefold structure, I
would argue that it is actually twofold, the second term acting as a hinge
between two diametrically opposed realms.
Step one, while promoting abstraction,
remains nevertheless within the realm of traditional perception, the
classically gestalt structure of "figure-ground," where forms
("gestalts"), concrete or abstract, are presented against a more or
less passive background space. As I have
argued elsewhere, "space" in this sense is the equivalent of syntax,
that structure ("tax") which brings together ("syn") -- the
ultimate source of all "grammatical" rules.[23] Forms (or figures) perceived in such a space
are a necessary precondition for any sign function, since clearly a sign must
exist in a gestalt (figure-ground) context in order to be meaningfully
perceived at all.
Step two, the "opening of
form," is the breakup of this pictorial syntagma through the undermining
of the gestalt which grounds it. In, for
example, the most complex of the Mondrian tree paintings, the highly
differentiated (facetted) canvas is not
differentiated along lines that will produce the differences (articulations)
necessary for semiosis. On the contrary,
as in analytic Cubism, any meaningful articulation that might be produced by
such facetting is immediately cancelled by erasures (passages) which open
normally forbidden channels between contiguous forms to obliterate
difference. Thus any possible
sign/gestalt is destructively opened to the overall space in a process of
perpetual deferral of meaning (not unrelated, it would seem, to Jacques
Derrida's "differance"[24]).
Thanks, therefore, to the
transformation effected in step two, the "spatial field" of step
three is profoundly different from that of step one -- we have progressed from
the virtual, syntactic space of traditional pictorialism and conservative
modernism to something radically new:
A
New Proportion
Ultimately, for Mondrian, the
"logical consequences" of Cubism, the "expression of pure
reality," are intimately connected with the "dynamic,"
"liberated," "universal," "rhythm of determinate
mutual relations," that "living rhythm" "achieved through
the proportions within which the plastic means are placed." One might go so far as to say that the
thoroughgoing process of reduction and simplification, so evident in Mondrian's
work from the second set of tree paintings to the rectilinear abstractions of
the Twenties and beyond, is guided by an increasingly conscious need to clarify
these proportions and bring them into the foreground of the viewer's
awareness. Ultimately proportional
determination becomes equivalent to the creative act itself.
What, we must now ask, is the basis
for this proportional determination? A
great deal of confusion has arisen from the common tendency to associate the
rectilinearity of Mondrian (and late Cubism) with geometry. In such a context, any reference to "proportions"
implies some sort of systematic, even mechanical procedure. This kind of thinking has led to completely
misguided speculations regarding Mondrian's employment of geometrically derived
proportions.[25]
Such speculations are totally
incompatible with the developmental process revealed in our analysis of the
"tree" series. It is the
perspective system, thoroughly undermined by the Cubists, which is dependent on
geometry. Cubism begins as a reaction
against any such systemization, a return to direct observation of
contingencies. Similarly, Mondrian's
work, from the second set of tree pictures through the works of 1914, derives
its proportions from careful observation of "individual rhythms" as
manifested in a particular tree, building facade, etc. After 1914, having ceased to depend on an
external model, he does not then suddenly take up geometry, but clearly
proceeds on the basis of the same principle that he had sought in the earlier
work. The extreme reductionism of his
later paintings, their avoidance of any form of symmetry or regularity, their
dependence on the rectilinear opposition of vertical and horizontal lines, can
be regarded both as manifestations of this principle and, in a more subtle
sense, clarifications of the sort that will permit the principle more readily
to manifest itself.
Mondrian had explained to a young
colleague, Charmion von Wiegand, "that he did not work with instruments
nor through analysis, but by means of intuition and the eye. He tests each picture over a
long period by eye: it is a physical
adjustment of proportion through training, intuition and testing."[26] To this can be added the testimony of Harry
Holtzman, an intimate friend:
"Mondrian's painting method, which he called 'pure intuition,' was
the direct approach, by trial and error, to the given space of the canvas. There were no a priori measures of any kind,
there was no 'golden section.' He also
called it 'pure sensuality.'"[27]
In the light of Mondrian's writings,
which continually stress the importance of objectivity and precision, such
statements can seem disappointing. The
artist who works intuitively, making crucial decisions by eye, seems the very
type of subjectivist whose outlook Mondrian rejected. The contradiction is resolved only when we
grasp the full extent of the dialectic involved. Within the context of traditional pictorial
syntax, the intuitive perception of the artist functions as a vaguely defined
subjectivity operating in relation to a highly defined and objective overall
controlling system, that pictorial "language" which finds its
culmination in scientific perspective.
With Mondrian, not only is any such system opposed, but all the factors
contributing to this opposition are ultimately reduced and clarified to the
point that their guiding principle can be evaluated directly and completely by eye. In such a context, intuitive perception
functions objectively and with precision.
This totally new situation would seem
to throw theory into a crisis. In the
complete absence of system (functioning either as a structural determinant or an object of resistance), in a
context where the eye of the artist is the sole criterion of value, there is
apparently nothing at all of a concrete nature to be said about that
"dynamic rhythm of determinate mutual relations," that "dynamic
equilibrium" which is the ultimate product of Mondrian's search for the
universal principle residing in the particular.
Open
Structure
Given the
finality of the above conclusion, respecting always the fact that the
precisions of any given Mondrian painting can ultimately be neither explained
nor even stated (in words), it is still possible, nevertheless, for theory to
speculate regarding the conditions satisfied by such precisions.
Basic to Mondrian's
"classic" works (dating from the period 1925 through, roughly, 1939)
is the manner in which their rectilinear lines and planes
"annihilate" (to use Mondrian's term) each other. In other words, the proportional relations of
both (we must remember that Mondrian's lines are thick enough to carry planar
weight and often vary in thickness) are such that no element is present as a figure against a ground, no gestalt
emerges. While technically the lines
contain rectangles, these do not come forward perceptually as isolated
forms. Neither does any particular
configuration of lines come forward.
Most important, the total design, thoroughly non-centric, does not form
a gestalt, but remains open to the
space around it.
The whole is therefore not greater than the sum of its
parts. Each part, clearly differentiated
(by shape, position and, more rarely, color) from every other part, is
nevertheless equivalent to every other part and to the whole. While each element is clearly articulated,
non is rigidly circumscribed‑‑all is in flux.
The
Seeing of Seeing
The evolution
of Mondrian's work and thought may be compared with the preliminary
simplifications of Euclid or Descartes, leading backwards toward that which can
have no other basis than intuition itself: the axiom. But there is a profound difference between
conceptual and perceptual intuition, between the geometrical or logical axiom,
which Mondrian unquestionably rejected, and the completely new kind of
"axiom" embodied in his mature paintings. The axioms of Euclid and Descartes can be
stated as propositions. Those of
Mondrian, as we have seen, cannot. His
ultimate decisions regarding the precise proportions (and, of course, colors)
of any given canvas must be regarded as "axiomatic" (thus, in some
sense self‑evident) to the eye alone. By
this I do not mean either the "empirical" eye of science or the
"logical" eye of geometry or even gestalt psychology, but, to use
Mondrian's own term, the "sensual" eye of purely sensory
experience. This unveiling of the
"perceptual axiom" at the heart of "the universal which resides
in the particular" confirms what we may call sensory determination as the ultimate goal, not only of Mondrian's
"completion" of Cubism, but the long evolution of realism as
well. Sensory determination ‑‑ this phrase must be understood in two
ways, both of which are equally valid in the present context: determination by means of the senses;
determination of the senses.
Mondrian's progressive reductionism is
a journey to the heart, not simply of "realism," painting or artistic
experience, but vision itself, for the first time liberated from the
totalizations of thought. His "classic"
canvasses, not simply through abstraction, but by destroying the figure-ground
relation itself, liberate vision from meaning, freeing visual perception to be
experienced more or less completely in its own terms. Proportional determination, originating as
the disruption of the sign, achieved by means of sensory judgement, is thus
equivalent to determination of the
senses. In this light, the "spatial
field" of step three must be regarded both as the surface and the perceptual field (what I have
called elsewhere the "negative field"[28]). In determining such a "space"
Mondrian is determining this field, articulated (brought into existence) on the
painted surface, where it may be said that seeing itself is made visible.
B. The
Disruption of Essence
If the above might encourage us to
characterize Mondrian as the coldest of the cold objectivists, it must also be
acknowledged that the work of few artists has been permeated with a warmer
subjectivity. The Romantic, indeed
Expressionist, element which so obviously pervades his earlier paintings is
still, in fact, strongly present (albeit greatly transformed) in the
later. We must seek out the meaning of
this apparent contradiction and deal with the very serious misunderstandings to
which it has given rise.
Mondrian
and the Romantic Tradition
In his
influential book, Modern Painting and the
Northern Romantic Tradition, Robert Rosenblum isolates a predominantly North European tradition of
nature‑mysticism. Taking as his point of
departure early Nineteenth century works by Caspar David Friedrich and Philipp Otto Runge, Rosenblum
traces a line of development through such figures as Blake, Turner, Van Gogh,
and Munch, to modernists such as Nolde, Marc, Kandinsky, Mondrian, and the
Abstract Expressionists, notably Still, Pollock, Newman and Rothko. Motivating this development are "dreams
of mystical and spiritual realms" which, "in their transcendental
ambitions, . . . perpetuated the Romantic search for an art
that could penetrate beneath the material surfaces of things and extract a
religious essence." Occupying a key
place in this scheme is
the
Dutchman, Piet Mondrian, who provided the clearest and most artistically
compelling link between a nineteenth century tradition based on the themes, the
spaces, the emotions of Northern Romantic art and the transformation of these
historical roots into a twentieth century art where all explicit references to
the material world are banned.[29]
An obvious link between Mondrian and
the earliest manifestations of the tradition invoked above is to be found in
the same "Tree" series we have already examined. The special significance of trees for the
Northern Romantic artist is discussed in some detail by Rosenblum, who cites
compelling examples by Friedrich, Constable, Dahl and Van Gogh. He speaks of "an empathy of the artist
with the life of an individual tree" so intense that the tree can
"become a sentient, almost human presence." Specifically comparing Mondrian's Red Tree with those of Friedrich and Van Gogh, he finds in this
work and the Blue Tree reflections
"of radiant, organic vitality so potent that it can transform roots,
trunk, and branches into a vibrant web, hovering in some transitional domain
between matter and spirit, solid and void." Such works are really symbols
evoking "elemental forces and mysteries."
These themes are crystallized in his
discussion of the "neo‑Romantic botany" of Rudolph Steiner, founder
of the spiritual "science," Theosophy. To Steiner, heavily in debt to Goethe's
notion of the "primordial plant," all plant species share a fundamental
structural principle, reflecting the workings of the universe itself.[30]
Theosophy
and the Archetype
In light of
the fact that Steiner's Theosophy distills and elaborates on the tradition of
nature mysticism invoked by Rosenblum, Mondrian's well known association with
the Theosophical movement becomes especially significant. This association, documented in Robert P.
Welsh's "Mondrian and Theosophy,"[31]
undoubtedly had a profound effect.
Mondrian, who joined the Dutch Theosophical Society in 1909, was an avid
reader of Steiner and his associate Madame Blavatsky, whose ideas, as Welsh
demonstrates, are reflected in many aspects of his work and thought.
Probably the most ambitious and, in
many ways, convincing attempt, in modern times, to erect a theoretical framework
for the nexus of ideas and associations invoked by belief systems such as
nature‑mysticism and Theosophy can be found in the writings of Freud's famous
disciple, C. G. Jung. Basic to Jung's
theories is the notion of the collective
unconscious, a deep layer of the psyche, which is, in some sense, shared by
all humans. The collective unconscious
manifests itself by means of certain forms, found world‑wide in myths, dreams,
art and religious iconography, which according to Jung, carry a universally
meaningful symbolism: the archetypes.
Mondrian's tree motif, especially as
interpreted by Rosenblum, is an excellent example of an archetype. Jung has, in fact, devoted to this subject a
lengthy essay, "The Philosophical Tree," which begins as follows:
An image
which frequently appears among the archetypal configurations of the unconscious
is that of the tree or the wonder‑working plant. When these fantasy products are drawn or
painted, they very often fall into symmetrical patterns that take the form of a
mandala. If a mandala may be described
as a symbol of the self seen in cross section, then the tree would represent a
profile view of it: the self depicted as
a process of growth.[32]
Mandala and Cross
Mondrian's Blue Tree is one of a group of
contemporary works which clearly exhibit, in the words of Jung,
"symmetrical patterns that take the form of a mandala." The mandala,
which means, literally, "circle" or "magic circle" is, of
course, associated with that aspect of Oriental religious iconography which has
had crucial significance for Theosophy.
According to Jung, the mandala is among the most important of archetypes
and is to be found almost universally as a symbol of the self.
He has written that "most
mandalas take the form of a flower, cross or wheel and show a distinct tendency
toward quaternary structure. . . "[33] The fourfold "quaternary" structure
of the mandala is related to the alchemical notion of the "unification of
opposites," a fundamental principle to which Jung devoted his last and
most extensive work, Mysterium Coniunctionis.[34] Here we are very close indeed to Theosophy,
for the conjunction of opposites is symbolized by the cross, to Madame
Blavatsky "the master-key which opens the door of every science, physical
as well as spiritual."[35] For Jung the cross is the fundamental
underlying structure of the mandala itself.
Rosenblum follows the development of
the tree motif into that of the cross, concluding that Mondrian "could
hardly have avoided the association of religious meaning with elementary
geometric pattern, a pattern that was in fact to become the structural basis of
the remaining thirty years of his objectless, abstract art."[36]
Bringing the above set of associations
into line with Mondrian's theories, we might say that
"neutralization" of the tree‑image has more clearly revealed the
abstract, circular, symmetrical mandala form that is veiled by the
"natural appearance" of the tree.
Since the mandala nevertheless remains a "limited form," it
too must be broken up (in subsequent paintings) to reveal its underlying
structural principle: the "unification of opposites" that is the
cross, for Mondrian the "primordial relation."[37] Interiorization of this powerful symbol
would, finally, put one in touch with Jung's mystic "archetype as
such," existing prior to the formation of any image, equivalent to
Mondrian's notion of space itself.[38]
Asymmetry
The above
discussion, from Rosenblum's invocation of nature mysticism and Theosophy to
the distillation of such notions in Jung's archetype, presents a totally
convincing picture of Mondrian's development up to and including the period of
the Blue Tree (1910), adding a great
deal, moreover, to our understanding of certain aspects of his work and thought
throughout his career. Nevertheless, as should be clear from our analysis of
the Tree series, it would be a serious error to assume that the impact of
Cubism in 1911 did not profoundly alter Mondrian's relation to the whole set of
ideas invoked by Rosenblum and Welsh.
Their failure to fully take this into account has had an unfortunate
effect on the currently prevailing critical view of Mondrian's work as a whole.
For example, Dore Ashton has written
of "the occult symmetries through which Mondrian meant to depict his
intimations of the essential world ‑‑ essential as the ever-unchanged schema
Plato admired in geometry. All radiates
from the centre here as, eventually, all of Mondrian's circles would be
squared."[39]
If we are to profit from the genuine
insights of Rosenblum and Welsh, we must be careful to avoid this sort of
misguided but completely typical generalization. Principle number 6 of Mondrian's
"General Principles of Neo‑Plasticism" is among his clearest and most
unequivocal theoretical statements:
"all symmetry shall be excluded."[40]
The circle, the square, the mandala,
the cross, the "fourfold conjunction of opposites," are, in their
very essence, symmetrical. While the
Mondrian of 1910 is turning his trees
into mandalas where "all radiates from the centre," from 1911 onward,
beginning with works such as the Gray
Tree, he is progressively decentering
the image. The process of reduction and
fragmentation begun in 1908 as a means of suppressing contingencies in favor of
a dematerialized, symbolic essence is, in 1911, transformed into a means of
subverting the symbolic process itself.
This involves not only the rejection
of symmetry but also the rejection of any form of hierarchical, geometrically
systematized proportioning. References
to Plato, geometry, circles, squares are relevant only to those works completed
before 1911. As has already been
demonstrated, the proportions "which create the living rhythm" of
dynamic equilibrium have their origin in the contingencies of observation, the
active interaction of the eye and the object of its regard. Aside from the role of elements such as
straight lines and right angles in clarifying and stabilizing such interaction,
geometry has no role whatever to play in Mondrian's most characteristic work.
If he had never been confronted with
the discoveries of Cubism, Mondrian might have moved on from the Blue Tree to an ever clearer
distillation of its underlying geometry, arriving finally at the ultimate
Theosophic, archetypal and, of course, Christian, symbol: the cross.
What in fact happened was much more complex. Fusing Cubism with the goals of Theosophy, he
retained from the cross its basic principle ‑‑ the conjunction of opposites
through the intersection of horizontal and vertical forces, the
"primordial relation." But, "in each given case Neo‑Plasticism must, so to speak,
break up the representation of the primordial relation . .
. To represent the horizontal
position and the upright position as a unity, without anything else, would
evidently not be art, but at most a symbol."[41] Thus, the cross itself, as a meaningful
configuration, a "limiting form," a symbolizing unity, is thoroughly
disrupted in virtually all the later works.
Intensification
as Reversal
Mondrian's
relation to the Romantic project invoked by Rosenblum, the neo‑Platonic search
for a dematerialized, transcendent essence, is complex indeed. Beyond question, Mondrian's involvement with
Theosophy had a lifelong influence on his thought, to the extent that there is
little in his theories which could not be interpreted in purely Theosophical
terms. However, too many critics and
scholars have overlooked the complete incompatibility of such an interpretation
with the actual structure of the mature paintings. If Mondrian's theories regarding the
neutralization of natural appearance, the destruction of limited form, and the
unification of opposites are to be read simply as invocations of some
Theosophically inspired archetype, then his paintings would have to be
mandalas!
On the other hand, Mondrian's
relentless search for the fundamental principle behind the Cubist attack on
pictorial syntax clearly has its source in his original, Theosophically
orthodox, project, the impetus of which was strong enough to carry him beyond
the largely iconographic‑iconoclastic preoccupations of Cubism.
More generally speaking, exploration
of this necessary link with the Romantic tradition can tell us much about the
vital, subjective side of the long evolution from realism to
"formalist" modernism. Indeed
it seems to have been the presence of a hyper‑Romantic, expressionist intensity
that distinguished the highly subjective, almost fanatical projects of Cezanne
and the Cubists from the aloof scientism of the Impressionists. Cezanne's early canvasses are personal and
impulsive in the extreme ‑‑ his subsequent naturalism is no less intense. Picasso's painting, at the very threshold of
Cubism, is remarkable for its slashing savagery.
In characteristically expressionist fashion,
Mondrian also projects his own feelings onto the motif and, at the same time,
interiorizes it. The progressive
fragmentations of the archetypal tree images may thus be considered equivalent
in some sense to a process of internal disintegration and transformation, a
process which only intensifies after 1911.
It should not be difficult, at this
point, to understand the apparently paradoxical affinities between extreme
realism and the expressionist impulse.
The search for "objective" vision must ultimately involve
consideration of the visual process itself which must, of course, have a
subjective component. Only the artist
with a strong subjectivity will in any case be aware of the extent to which the
"real world" is a projection of the "world within." Only an artist with a passionate attachment
to nature will so intensely internalize not only the motif but the naturalist
project itself.
In this context we can much better
grasp the deep inner need that motivates the struggle to see which lies at the
root of naturalism and modernism both.
It is a struggle which takes place "within,"
"without" and between the two, the expression of a profound desire
for unification of the self through integration of self and world. At the core of this struggle, however, is the
necessary reversal which takes us beyond the limits of the Romantic
project. The self cannot be integrated
with the world without first becoming disunified. The struggle to see involves the
fragmentation of self, the opening out of self, spirit, meaning, to the
contingencies of the visible world.
What to the Romantic sensibility would
mean death, madness or some totally otherworldly "spirituality,"
becomes, ultimately, (simply?), the liberation of the senses. Thus for Mondrian the struggle to see is
inseparable from what to him is the characteristically modern effort to
overcome "the tragic."[42]
The ease with which Mondrian's
theories may be read as orthodox Theosophy attests to the difficulty of
grasping the reversal that carries him far beyond any form of Romantic
idealism. Only a reading of Mondrian in
terms of the very different framework I have presented can reconcile his ideas
with the salient characteristics of his creative output. The archetype, as a centralized,
mandala-like, symbolic conjunction of opposites, can be regarded as the essence
of pictorial syntax, thus, in fact, the mirror image opposite of a mature
painting by Mondrian, the latter being a pure instance of that which destroys
syntax, that which I have chosen, in another context, to call negative syntax (or antax).[43] Such a painting is, in fact, an anti‑mandala, decentralized by the disjunction
of opposites, and thoroughly non‑symbolic.
While the Jungian archetype realizes
unification on an ideal, totally non‑material plane, the realm of the
"collective unconscious," a Mondrian painting becomes unified only on
its own surface, a limited material entity which is the exact opposite of the
archetype. On this surface as well, the
limited, material realm of the senses attains unification with "the
world" in terms of the concrete perceptual field created therein by the
artist.
C. The
Politics of Essence
Interestingly,
those aspects of Mondrian's thought which for Rosenblum reveal an extreme
Romantic outlook have become, in our postmodern age, typical symptoms of
modernism. Thus a quest for the
"essential," the "universal," has been descried as an
especially noxious aspect of a grandiose, deluded modernism, conspiring within
a politics of totalization and power.
An unusually penetrating and
thoroughgoing analysis of Mondrian's art and writings from this standpoint can
be found in the recently published Making
Theory/Constructing Art, by Daniel Herwitz.[44] By coming to grips with the rather harsh
criticism presented in this book, we may better comprehend the ethical/Utopian
implications of Mondrian's thought in the context of the cultural politics of
postmodernism. Our discussion of
Rosenblum and Jung has prepared us for this strongly argued but ultimately
misguided judgement.
Mondrian
and Plato
Herwitz'
dominant concern is with the manner in which theoretical discourse has come to
dominate artistic awareness in the world of the "avant-garde," both
modernist and postmodernist (and to his credit, Herwitz, though writing from an
essentially postmodernist position, is equally skeptical of the more extreme
claims emanating from both camps). For
him, "Mondrian's art raises the question of the capacity of a visually
abstract object to be the transparent bearer of ideas." To this end Mondrian, the
"theosopher/philosopher," "aims to turn every inch of his
paintings into abstract signifiers, so that, like the signs or words of a
divine language or philosophical code, they can be invested with maximum
semantic value."[45] The point of this enterprise is the idealist
desire "to make his paintings into platonic forms which 'speak' or
'demonstrate' the truths of the world"[46]
through "a perfected harmonization which exemplifies the inner harmony of
all things."[47] This "turn to philosophical theory takes
place in the context of his vision of utopia and of his perfect certainty that
his artworks with their Platonistic form will bring utopia about by
exemplifying it."[48]
For Herwitz, as for Rosenblum and so
many others, Mondrian's notions of "form," "space," and
"harmony" are utterly traditional, unproblematic derivations from a
fundamentally neoplatonic position.
"Forms" are the Platonic forms which underlie and must
ultimately replace all particulars; "space" is the ultimate
dissolution of all such forms into a single, unified, transcendence;
"harmony" is the ideal relation of forms and space, a pleasing,
mellifluous consonance which can peacefully unite a painting, a nation, a
world. Together they produce a message
of abstract totalized essence, the perfect blueprint for the most perfectly
soporific Utopia anyone might ever desire.
Herwitz, of course, is buying none of
it. And clearly, such a
"Utopia" would quickly degenerate into a nightmare of delusion,
hypocrisy, control and exploitation in which "The Universal" would be
achieved at the expense of individuality, "competing interests, divergent
styles of belief, religion, historical consciousness, political taste,"[49]
etc.
Is this cloying super-Platonic fantasy
an accurate assessment of Mondrian's vision?
His writings, liberally quoted by Herwitz, are full of high sounding
pronouncements of the sort that might indeed encourage us to answer in the
affirmative. Herwitz has not the
slightest doubt: "Mondrian's
[example], like Plato's and Christ's, is belief in the world-transforming power
of ideas: he is a Platonist."[50]
Mondrian's
Sword
But, also like
Christ, Mondrian comes offering "not peace, but a sword." The artist-philosopher who could say "I
think the destructive element is too much neglected in art,"[51]
wanted, as I have already argued, to destroy not simply "the natural"
or "the individual" but "any idea." If, for Mondrian, as Herwitz claims,
"form" means "Platonic form," what are we to make of his
many references to form as an outworn relic of the past which must be
"broken up," "annihilated" or "abolished"? How, for example, are we to take the
following, with its Nietzscheian (and Derridaian) overtones?
We now
discover that the basis of form is not
unchangeable as the old culture thought.
The new culture abolishes form, together with the old morality. . . Jazz and Neo-Plasticism are already creating
an environment in which art and philosophy resolve into rhythm that has no form
and is therefore "open."[52]
And Mondrian's notion of
"harmony"? "Neo-Plastic
harmony arises from constant oppositions. The harmony of Neo-Plasticism is therefore
not traditional harmony, but universal
harmony, which to the eyes of the past appears rather as discord."[53]
Herwitz sees Mondrian as attempting to
sublimate the particular, the individual into a totalizing
"universal." However a careful
reading will show that Mondrian usually uses the phrase "particular form," designating the particular
manifesting itself as a gestalt. As our earlier analysis has shown, Mondrian
is opposed to this not because of a Platonic disdain for the particular in
itself, as a concrete limited entity, but out of an awareness that within the
particular form lies hidden and repressed the "living rhythm"
that is the basic principle of
particularity (materiality, concreteness, contingency) itself. If we substitute for "the
individual" the term "Ego," the notion of repression comes into
stronger relief and a link with Freud becomes evident.
A
Dialectical Reversal
The
psychotherapeutic meaning of Mondrian's work is the subject of an especially
insightful recent essay, "The Geometrical Cure," by Donald
Kuspit. Though, like Herwitz and so many
others, he too easily reads geometry and traditional philosophy (in this case,
Spinoza) into Mondrian's theories, Kuspit recognizes the connection between
Mondrian's project and the eminently anti-Platonic healing program of
Freud. For Kuspit, Mondrian (and
Malevich) "are the truly transmutative artists, . . . for their geometry
evokes the original wholeness of the self by affording a peak experience of
primordiality."[54] Even more to the point in the present
context, Kuspit is among the very few to have recognized that Mondrian, like
Freud, must be understood dialectically. Comparing Mondrian with Malevich, he accuses
the latter of having mistaken "totality for wholeness because he could not
comprehend its dialectical character.
(Mondrian obviously did, which is why his wholeness never has the look
of stark totality characteristic of Malevich's abstraction.)"[55] In recognizing that "wholeness" and
"totalization" are not necessarily the same thing, we are reminded
that modernism itself may be more subtle than the postmodernists (who are
always attacking modernism for its "totalizing" ambitions) have been
willing to accept, that we cannot afford to literalize the complexities of
dialectic into crude affirmations of ultimate "Truth."
This, as should now be evident, is
exactly what Herwitz has done. Despite
his many insights, and, unfortunately, like so many others who have tried to
make sense of Mondrian's writings, he is insensitive to the possibility that
Mondrian might be struggling to say the exact opposite of what he appears to be
saying. We cannot completely blame
Herwitz or anyone else for falling into this trap. As Mondrian himself has bitterly complained:
How
deplorable that such timeworn, conventional language must serve to express the
new beauty: to describe the means and
the goal of purely abstract art, we are compelled to use the same terms that we
use for naturalistic art -- but with what a difference in their meaning!
When
we speak of "harmony," we do not mean anything like traditional
harmony. . . The words
"equilibrium," "pure plastic," "abstract,"
"universal," "individual," etc., can be similarly
misunderstood . . .[56]
The
meaning of words has become so blurred by past usage that "abstract"
is identified with "vague" and "unreal," and
"inwardness" with a sort of traditional beatitude. Thus, most people do not understand that the
"spiritual" is better expressed by some ordinary dance music than in
all the psalms put together.[57]
Theory
vs. Art?
To his credit,
Herwitz recognizes that there is something very wrong with the
"meta-narrative" he finds in Mondrian's texts: it does violence to the art. The discrepancy between a typical Mondrian
painting, which "resists all prefigurement by words. . . feels complete in
itself, unreachable and uninterpretable. . ."[58]
and the conceptual burden Mondrian supposedly expects it to bear is in fact the
point of much of Herwitz' argument, hinging as it does on the premise that
Avant-Garde theory is designed to direct and control the way we experience
Avant-Garde art. Herwitz is claiming that
while Mondrian the theorist is attempting to control the look and meaning of
his art, to force it to signify Platonic ideas, the art itself resists by
defeating signification of any kind.
That Mondrian's art resists
signification is indeed one of the major points of this essay. However, to assume that Mondrian the writer
nevertheless expects these works to actually symbolize specific aspects of his
theory is to seriously misread -- Mondrian never makes such a claim and is
clearly opposed to any form of the symbolic in art.[59] The discrepancy between theory and practice
exists not because Mondrian the artist was a genius while Mondrian the thinker
was "wooly" or "dotty," as Herwitz implies (he is certainly
not alone in this assessment), but because Herwitz has failed to plumb the
depth of the dialectic at work in Mondrian's thought.[60]
This should not be surprising. Mondrian was an artist/thinker who made an
important discovery that he was able to articulate perfectly in his art, but
not his writings. Since in his theory he
was attempting (not unlike Derrida!) to deploy the intellectual tools of
idealism to undermine idealism itself it is not surprising that he was never
able to make himself perfectly clear. I
believe this situation confused him to the point that too much in his writings
hopelessly conflates the conceptual and anti-conceptual, geometry and
sensuality, idealism and materialism (despite some earnest attempts to make
just these sorts of distinctions -- he unquestionably lacked the literary and
philosophical skills of a Derrida.) Not
only does this make his writings especially difficult, it leads on occasion to
political claims that are indeed dangerously naive (not because they are
necessarily misguided or hopelessly Utopian, but because he has seriously
underestimated the potential for the sort of misunderstanding that could
oversimplify or even reverse his meaning with disastrous results).
Only when we concentrate on his art
and, most especially, as we have in section A of this essay, the development of his art from around 1908
on, does a consistent theoretical picture emerge. We can, only then, turn back to the writings
with some hope of understanding what is really meant.
A System For
the Disruption of System
What, then, is really meant? What, ultimately is Mondrian struggling so
patiently to communicate in essay after essay, statement after statement
spanning a period of over twenty-five years?
I have of course already had a good deal to say on this matter, in
sections A and B above, but there is something more fundamental, something
especially relevant in the age of post-structuralism and deconstruction, an age
struggling to free itself from its own suffocating, totalizing
"mastery" of technology, art and thought:
The Mondrian who was so profoundly
influenced by Cubism, and the most radical aspects of Futurism and
Constructivism was never a Platonist.
Nevertheless, he was, in a
sense, a Platonist, as is revealed in his purist attempt to attain the essence
of that which disrupts limited form,
which disrupts "any idea." He
operates in the spirit of Plato by
pursuing an ideal,[61]
but, as has been demonstrated by our earlier discussion of his theosophy, the
ideal he pursues is the destruction
of idealism itself. As we learned in our
analysis of the Tree series, he has discovered a unique structural principle which promotes that which has been repressed
and bound by form and "essence."
This principle is itself a new universal, a new essence, a new order,
the antipode of the Platonic essence, an order that can oppose repression by opening out Platonic ideas like
"particular form" and "the individual." This is the "essence," the
"universal," the "unity" that Mondrian speaks of when he is
sounding Platonic.
What Yve-Alain Bois has had to say
with regard to a particular Mondrian painting (but which could in fact be
applied to many) seems especially relevant at this juncture:
It goes
without saying that this picture -- like the classical neoplastic paintings in
general -- does not come under the heading of systemic or programmed art. But if it is not systemic, isn't it, in some
way, systematic? Isn't there a system
functioning within it, entirely apparent, whose goal is to prohibit any stasis
or fixing of perception in a systematic assurance?[62]
Mondrian's discovery of what we have
called "the perceptual axiom," the anti-axiom which explodes the
"axiomatic" itself, opens up just such a possibility: a system for the disruption of system. The disruption would be radical indeed, for
Mondrian, artist and thinker, has taken us far beyond the sort of dialectic
which, like the signifying process itself, disrupts only to reunite its
fragments on a "higher" level in a perpetual process of unfolding
"transcendence." Nor could a
disruptive force of such magnitude be contained by the "informal"
workings of postmodernist bricolage or rhetoric, weak-tea notions totally alien
to Mondrian's diamond-hard vision. The
new, essentially contingent, spatial
field revealed in the "classic" works from 1918 on is fully
independent, fully the equal of the traditional "syntactic field" it
negates (but does not transcend), and
need not be "redeemed" by higher level incorporation into anything
else whatsoever.
For me this profound discovery, firmly
grounded in the extraordinary researches of predecessors like Cezanne, Braque
and Picasso, paralleled by the remarkably similar discoveries of Schönberg and
Webern, is both that which lies at the heart of modernism and exactly that
which has escaped notice in the many postmodernist attempts to "go
beyond" it. Such an oversight is
deeply unfortunate, since this radical dialectic on some level achieves what
most postmodernists have announced to be a prime goal of their own: the neutralization, breakup and
reconstitution of the overmastering, totalizing, controlling forces of our
time.[63] If Mondrian's Utopian vision has any meaning
at all, it prefigures exactly this.
Notes
[1]. See Victor Grauer,
"Modernism/postmodernism/neomodernism" in Downtown Review 3-1/2 (1982) pp. 3-7.
[2]. Victor Grauer, "Toward a Unified Theory of the
Arts," in Semiotica 94-3/4
(1993) pp. 233-252.
[3]. Seuphor 171.
[4]. According to historian Hans Jaffe, Mondrian probably
first viewed Cubist paintings at an Amsterdam exhibit held in the autumn of
1911, but had undoubtedly heard of the movement and seen reproductions before
this time. Hans Jaffe, Piet Mondrian (New York:Abrams, undated)
pp. 24,25.
[5]. Seuphor 177.
[6]. Seuphor 190-200.
[7]. Seuphor 294.
[8]. Alfred Jarry may have anticipated Mondrian with his
only partially whimsical notion of "'pataphysics," the "science
of the laws governing exceptions."
[9]. Piet Mondrian, "Toward the True Vision of
Reality" (1942), in Mondrian, Plastic
Art and PUre Plastic Art (New York:Wittenborn, 1945) p. 10.
[10]. While it is my belief that the overall result does in
fact reflect Mondrian's intentions, I may be wrong. (Perhaps those who might accuse me of
concocting a Mondrian of "my own," will also be willing to credit me
with "his" insights.)
[11]. Ibid., p. 13.
[12]. "A New Realism," (1943) in Plastic Art . . . op. cit., p. 18.
[13]. "Toward the True Vision . . .," op. cit., p.
13.
[14]. "A New Realism," op. cit., p. 20.
[15]. "Plastic Art and Pure Plastic Art" (1937), in
Plastic Art . . . op. cit. p. 58.
[16]. "A New Realism," op. cit., p. 25.
[17]. Ibid., p. 25.
[18]. "Plastic Art and Pure . . ." op. cit., p. 58.
[19]. "A New Realism," op. cit., p. 25.
[20]. "General Principles of Neo-Plasticism" (1926)
in Seuphor, op. cit., p. 166.
[21]. "Pure Plastic Art" ( 1942), in Plastic Art .
. . , op. cit., p. 31.
[22]. Ibid., p. 31.
[23]. see Victor Grauer, "Toward a Unified Theory of the
Arts" op. cit., pp. 236-239.
[24]. The "it would seem" is necessary in view of
the extraordinary difficulty of defining Derrida's typically obscure neologism,
a "non-concept" in which "difference," "deferral"
and "erasure" apparently come together to defeat logic and meaning in
a manner that seems especially relevant here.
For a more thorough attempt at coming to grips with
"differance," see Alan Bass, "Translator's Introduction,"
in Jacques Derrida, Writing and
Difference (Chicago:University of Chicago Press, 1978), pp. xvi - xvii.
[25]. See, for example, Charles Bouleau, The Painter's Secret Geometry (New York:Hacker, 1963).
[26]. From the journals of Charmion von Wiegend, as quoted in
Seuphor, op. cit., p. 181.
[27]. Harry Holtzman,
"Piet Mondrian:The Man and His Work," in The New Art -- The New Life:The Collected Writings of Piet Mondrian,
edited and translated by Harry Holtzman and Martin S. James, (New York:Da Capo
Press, 1993), p. 6.
[28]. See Victor Grauer, "Toward a Unified Theory of the
Arts" op. cit., p. 243.
[29]. Robert Rosenblum, Modern
Painting and the Northern Romantic Tradition (New York:Harper and Row,
1975), p. 173.
[30]. Ibid., pp. 36, 180, 184.
[31]. Robert P. Welsh, "Mondrian and Theosophy," in
Piet Mondrian 1872-1944, Centennial
Exhibition Catalog (New York:Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1971) pp. 35-51.
[32]. C. G. Jung, "The Philosophical Tree," in
Jung, Alchemical Studies
(Princeton:Princeton University Press, 1967) p. 253.
[33]. Alchemical
Studies, op. cit., p. 22.
[34]. C. G. Jung, Mysterium
Coniunctionis (New York:Bollingen Foundation, 1963).
[35]. Helena Blavatsky, Isis
Unveiled, vol. II, as quoted in Robert P. Welsh, "Mondrian and
Theosophy", op. cit., p. 49.
[36]. Rosenblum, op. cit., pp. 193, 194.
[37]. See "Natural Reality and Abstract Reality,"
op. cit., first three "scenes."
[38]. Jung ultimately distinguishes between the
"archetype as such," a universal, imageless, essence, and the
particular, though still highly generalized, "archetypal images"
which represent it. See Jolanda Jacobi, Complex/Archetype/Symbol in the Psychology
of C. G. Jung (New York:Bollingen Foundation, 1959) p. 34.
[39]. Dore Ashton, "Mondrian:Notes on an Exhibition at
the Guggenheim Museum," in Artscanada
226/227 (May, June 1979). Ashton's
notion of radiation from the center may derive from a particularly misleading
essay by the artist, Max Bill, who claims that "one may visualize
[Mondrian's lines] extending beyond the rim of the image. The fixed center becomes a nucleus,
surrounded by possibilities of unlimited extension." Bill's notion has also been echoed by so
noted an authority as Meyer Schapiro in an otherwise highly insightfull essay,
"Mondrian:Order and Randomness in Abstract Painting" (1978). Both interpretations apparently derive from
an overly literal reading of Mondrian's notion of "open" structure,
as though the contents of an "open" painting were to be expected to
spill out into the surrounding space.
Such readings are refuted by the canvasses themselves, where many of the
lines do a 90 degree turn to continue onto the edge of the canvas, where they
clearly stop. This sort of highly
idealized interpretation would be better applied to the most ordinary Realist
and Romantic landscapes, where hills and dales ad infinitum are implied before, behind and to the sides. Old ideas die hard.
See Max Bill, "Composition 1 with
Blue and Yellow, 1925 by Piet Mondrian," in Piet Mondrian 1872-1944, op.
cit., p. 75 and Meyer Schapiro, "Mondrian:Order and Randomness in Abstract
Painting," in Schapiro, Modern Art
(Brazziler:New York, 1979).
[40]. Op. cit., p. 166.
[41]. "Natural Reality and Abstract Reality," op.
cit., p. 312.
[42]. See, for example, his comments in "Natural Reality
and Abstract Reality," op. cit., p. 318.
[43]. See Victor Grauer, "Toward a Unified Theory of the
Arts" op. cit., p. 244.
[44]. Daniel Herwitz, Making
Theory/Constructing Art:On the Authenticity of the Avant-Garde
(Chicago:University of Chicago Press, 1993)
[45]. Ibid., p. 98.
[46]. Ibid., p. 99.
[47]. Ibid., pp. 113-114.
[48]. Ibid., p. 97
[49]. Ibid., p. 131.
[50]. Ibid., p. 129.
[51]. From a letter to James Johnson Sweeney, in The New Art -- The New Life:The Collected
Writings of Piet Mondrian, ed. Harry Holtzman and Martin S. James (New
York:Da Capo Press, 1993), p. 357.
[52]. Mondrian, "Jazz and Neo-Plastic,"(1927) in
Ibid., pp. 220, 221.
[53]. "The Neo-Plastic Architecture of the Future,"
in ibid., p. 197.
[54]. Donald Kuspit, "The Geometrical Cure," in The Cult of the Avant-Garde Artist
(Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 44.
[55]. Ibid., p. 51.
[56]. "Purely Abstract Art," in The New Art -- The New Life, op. cit.,
p. 200.
[57]. "The Manifestation of Neo-Plasticism in Music and
the Italian Futurists' Bruiteurs,"
in ibid., p. 151.
Among the very few to have "gotten
the message" of this dialectic is art critic and Mondrian scholar
Yve-Alain Bois, whose comments on a well known Mondrian dictum should be taken
to heart by postmodernists all too eager to read dreams of mastery and control
into the meanings of Mondrian and so many others of his time: "[T]he famous 'if we cannot free ourselves,
we can free our vision' speaks also of a painting that would be entirely free
of the tragic that perception necessarily entails in that it always seeks to
impose an order, a particular structure, a "limitation," a stability
upon the free rhythm of the visual facts that confront it: to liberate our vision is also to accept that
we no longer master it." See
Yve-Alain Bois, Painting As Model
(Cambridge, Mass.:MIT Press, 1990), p. 162.
[58]. Herwitz, Making
Theory/Constructing Art, op. cit., p. 125
[59]. While to my
knowledge Mondrian never even implies that his art might signify or symbolize
anything whatsoever, he does frequently make what seems to me the perfectly
reasonable claim that his art demonstrates
fundamental aspects of his theory. To
Herwitz such a claim is even more extreme than that of simple signification,
but I disagree. To
"demonstrate" is clearly different in kind than to
"signify." We might for
example say that a particular bird in flight "demonstrates" certain
principles of aerodynamics. This doesn't
mean that we expect that from now on this or any bird will therefore
"signify" such principles or that anyone looking at such a bird is to
be expected to grasp such principles just by looking at it, by virtue of some
magical semiotic process. Clearly,
Mondrian's paintings demonstrate his artistic principles in the same way that
any art demonstrates the artistic principles of its creator. (It would be indeed quite strange if this
were not the case.) Saying this is not
the same as expecting that simply by staring at one of his paintings such
principles will become known to us, nor
is there any evidence that Mondrian had such an expectation.
[60]. Since I seem to be dumping on Herwitz at this point, I
feel compelled to add that I find his book as a whole quite sympathetic and
even important. Of the many to have
missed the point on Mondrian, Herwitz is among the most thoroughgoing and
perceptive, bothered by problems that others have never noticed, eager to give
difficult issues the careful consideration they deserve. If I've chosen him as "whipping
boy," it is largely for these reasons.
Herwitz' excellent treatment of Warhol and
Cage, his thorough analysis of the ideas of Arthur Danto and his logical,
skeptical approach to many key issues of modernism and postmodernism make his
book worthwhile reading indeed.
[61]. Donald Kuspit, who associates Mondrian's
"geometry" with the "geometrical method" of Spinoza, comes
very close to what I am saying here, but this statement requires some
explanation. As Kuspit assumes his
reader already knows, and thus unfortunately never actually states, Spinoza was
not a geometer in any ordinary sense. He
called his method "geometrical" only because it was analogous to the
axiomatic method of the geometer Euclid.
As Mondrian's "geometry" is generally assumed to be more
literally Euclidean, the comparison with Spinoza is a bit misleading. Also misleading, of course, is the suggestion
that Mondrian proceeded axiomatically in any traditional sense.
But, as I have argued in section A above,
Mondrian did operate axiomatically in
a very untraditional sense, by simplifying his approach to painting to the
point that each painting becomes itself what can only be called an
"anti-axiom" of the contingent.
He thus moves in the opposite direction from Spinoza, who built his
Ethic up from axioms. But, in this very opposition, motivated by
his intense hunger for the "union of the individual with the
universal," so similar, as Kuspit notes, to Spinoza's "the universal
within," Mondrian does proceed,
in this special sense of the word, "geometrically." See Donald Kuspit, "The Geometrical
Cure," op. cit., pp. 45-49.
[62]. Yve-Alain Bois, Painting
As Model, op. cit., p. 163.
[63]. The only major philosopher, to my knowledge, to have
fully grasped the significance of modernism in this sense was also profoundly
influenced by it. The "negative
dialectic" of Theodore Adorno is rooted in modernist music (he was a
member of the Schonberg circle), not painting, yet (not really surprisingly)
key aspects of his thought have a great deal in common with that of
Mondrian. In a comprehensive recent
study of Adorno's aesthetics, Lambert Zuidervaart writes:
Adorno's arguments are dialectical
in the sense that they highlight unavoidable tensions between polar opposites
whose opposition constitutes their unity and generates historical change. The
dialectic is negative in that it refuses to affirm any underlying identity or
final synthesis of polar opposites . . .
Substantive justification for a dialectical approach comes from the
"unconscious interaction" between universality
and particularity within modern art.
According to Adorno, modern art has taken a "radically nominalistic
position" . . .
Dialectical aesthetics . . . "deals with reciprocal relations
between universal and particular where
the universal is not imposed on the particular . . . but emerges from the
dynamic of particularities themselves." [Emphasis is mine.] See Lambert Zuidervaart, Adorno's Aesthetic Theory:The Redemption of Illusion (Cambridge,
Mass.:MIT Press, 1991), pp. 48-50.
This last
sounds very much like Mondrian's "clear realization of liberated and
universal rhythm distorted and hidden in the individual rhythm of the limiting
form." [see note 23]
Adorno's
negative dialectic, refusing to resolve itself into a fixed, totalized
conception, striving to maintain a radical gap between its irreconcilably
opposed terms, has, with good reason, been getting more and more attention in
the literature on postmodernism and is indeed a much needed corrective to some
of its more simplistic assumptions.
Whether any practice
ultimately grounded in language is capable of resisting the synthesizing pull
of traditional dialectics (metaphysics) has of course become, especially since
Heidegger and Derrida, an open and very difficult question. To the extent that Adorno, Derrida et al.
remain content to express themselves in language alone, as philosophers, their
efforts to achieve this radical split may be necessarily self-defeating --
inevitably destined, despite all "good intentions," to degenerate
into yet another mystifying "transcendence." In my view, Mondrian, himself already split, was in his own way able, if not to
explain, then to express something "essential" to this long sought
"end of metaphysics." But this
is a topic for another essay.
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