Mondrian

His Life, His Art, His Quest for the Absolute

Nicholas Fox Weber

$81.95

Hardback

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English

Alfred A. Knopf
22 October 2024

Individual artists, art monographs; Individual photographers; Individual architects & architectural firms; Biography; Biography: general; General & world history

The extraordinary and surprising life of Piet Mondrian, whose unprecedented geometric art revolutionized modern painting, architecture, graphic art, fashion design, and more—from acclaimed cultural historian Nicholas Fox Weber

""As fastidiously passionate as his subject's paintings. How wonderful it is to read of Mondrian's gaiety and zest. . . as well as his rigour and unrelenting commitment to his own, absolutely his own, view of art and the world."" —John Banville, national bestselling author of The Lock-Up

In the early 1920s, surrounded by the roaring streets of avant-garde Paris, Piet Mondrian began creating what would become some of the most recognizable abstract paintings of the 20th century. With rectangles of primary colors against a dazzling white background, this was geometric abstraction in its purest form. These revolutionary compositions exhilarated, intoxicated, confused, and enraged the international public—and changed the course of modern art forever.

Now, for the first time, Mondrian emerges alongside his thrilling art. Here is the life of an elusive modern master: from his youth in a religious household in the Netherlands where he first began painting Dutch farmhouses and sand dunes, to his move to Paris where he embraced the work of Pablo Picasso, Georges Seurat, and Cézanne, to the 1920s and onward where, surviving the turmoil of two world wars and embracing a rapidly shifting culture, Mondrian challenged the concept of art and invented a new world of undiluted colors and rhythmic straight lines. His work would go on to affect painting, architecture, fashion, and design in decades to come.

Here is also an intimate portrait of a complex artist, his solitude and avoidance of intimacy, his eccentricities and his philosophy, his passion for ballroom dancing, and his unwavering belief in art as a vehicle to reveal universal truths.

By: Nicholas Fox Weber
Imprint: Alfred A. Knopf
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 242mm, Width: 165mm, Spine: 50mm
Weight: 941g
ISBN: 9780307961594
ISBN 10: 0307961591
Pages: 656
Publication Date: 22 October 2024
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

NICHOLAS FOX WEBER has been the executive director of the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation for over four decades. He is the author of fifteen books, including iBauhaus, Le Corbusier, Balthus: A Biography, and Patron Saints. He lives in Connecticut, Paris, and Ireland.

Reviews for Mondrian: His Life, His Art, His Quest for the Absolute

"""Nicholas Fox Weber's biography of Piet Mondrian is as fastidiously passionate as his subject's paintings. How wonderful it is to read of Mondrian's gaiety and zest - he was a passionate dancer: who'd have thought? - as well as his rigour and unrelenting commitment to his own, absolutely his own, view of art and the world."" —John Banville, national best-selling author of The Lock-Up ""In Mondrian, the monk of modernism finally gets the flesh-and-blood portrait he deserves. The lifelong “quest for the absolute” does not shelter Mondrian from the temptations of love, the rewards and difficulties of friendship, or the profoundly playful spirit of jazz. Instead they enrich his art. This monk can dance."" —Mark Stevens, author of Francis Bacon ""Nicholas’s attention to detail is truly outstanding and it really shows here in this definitive book about Mondrian’s fascinating life, arts and quest. There have been many books about the man but this one is truly unique, Nicholas unearths many facts and details that Mondrian lovers like myself have never read before!"" —Sir Paul Smith"