Theo van Doesburg
From Wikiquote
Theo van Doesburg (30 August 1883 – 7 March 1931) was a Dutch artist, practicing in painting, writing, poetry and architecture. He is best known as the founder and leader of De Stijl together with Piet Mondrian. Later he engaged himself more with Dadaism, in cooperation with Kurt Schwitters and Hans Arp.
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- .. art and life are no longer separate domains.. ..The word ‘art’ no longer has anything to say to us. In place of that, we (= De Stijl) insist upon the construction of our surroundings according to creative laws, deriving from a fixed principle. (on integration of art in life, 1918)
- Abstract Art, Anna Moszynska, Thames and Hudson 1990, p. 85
- We speak of concrete and not abstract painting because nothing is more concrete, more real than a line, a colour, a surface. (1925)
- Abstract Art, Anna Moszynska, Thames and Hudson 1990, p. 107
- It must be emphasized that in seeing a work of art that has been composed by precise means, the viewer does not perceive dominant details. His impression is one of perfect balance to which all the parts contribute, an impression which not only applies to the parts as such, but is transmitted also to the relation existing between the work of art and the viewer. Although it is very difficult to express in words the effect of a work of art, it may be said that the viewer’s deepest impression can best be defined as the achievement of a balance between objective meaning and subjectieve meaning, both directly penetrated by awareness. He has a sensation of height and of depth which are no longer in any way bound to natural conditions or to spatial dimensions, a sensation which places the viewer in a state of consciousnes harmony. (1925)
- Abstract Painting, Michel Seuphor, Dell Publishing Co. 1964, p. 85-86
- True artistic experience is never passive, for the spectator is obliged to participate, as it were, in the continuous or discontinuous variations of proportions, positions, lines and planes. Moreover, he must see clearly how this play of repeated or non-repeated changes may give rise to a new harmony of relations which will constitute the unity of the work. Every part becomes organized into a whole with the other parts. All the parts contribute to the unity of the composition, none of them assuming a dominant place in the whole. (on the necessary unity of a piece of art, 1925)
- Abstract Painting, Michel Seuphor, Dell Publishing Co. 1964, p. 86
- The work of art should be entirely conceived and formed by the mind before its execution. It should receive nothing from Nature’s formal properties or from sensuality or sentimentality.. ..The picture should be constructed entirely from purely plastic elements, that is to say, planes and colours. A pictorial element has no other significance than ‘itself’, and therefore the picture has no other significance than 'itself'. (on plastic art)
- first and only issue of the artmagazine Art Concret, Paris 1930
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- "Art as we understand it.. ..does develop powers that in turn determine culture as a whole."
- "..every machine is the spiritualization of an organism." - Attributed to Theo van Doesburg by Reyner Banham in his book "Theory and design in the first machine age".
