2025-04-03
2017 promises to be an eventful year. A series of events and exhibitions have been planned across the Netherlands to accompany the centenary celebrations of De Stijl. This utopian, modernist art movement, based on asymmetrical compositions made up of simple, abstract forms and primary colours, has had a huge impact on art.
The movement, more widely known as Neoplasticism, was born in 1917 in Leiden, when Theo Van Doesburg founded the magazine De Stijl (style). The artists and architects gathered around the magazine presented a new vision of art based on the principle of harmony, which they believed was the only law of the universe. They also opposed naturalism and, using the extremely simplified language of abstraction, wanted to reflect a reality built on a balanced relationship of opposites. These ideas were developed by the most important Dutch artists of the time: the painters Pietr Mondrian, Vilmos Huszár and Bart van der Leck, the architects Gerrit Rietveld, Jacobus Johannes Pieter Oud, Robert van't Hof and the sculptor Georges Vantongerloo. Although the most representative works created in the spirit of Neo-Plasticism are paintings, the movement has also inspired many generations of architects, printmakers and craftsmen.
Art lovers are in for an unforgettable journey around the artistic philosophy of De Stijl: from the direction's origins in Leiden, via Amersfoort and Utrecht, where Mondrian, Van der Leck and Rietveld were born, to the capital of neo-plasticism in The Hague with the Gemeentemuseum and the world's largest collection of works by Mondrian and representatives of De Stijl, and ending in Brabant - the centre of Dutch design, graphic design and design clearly inspired by the style of neo-plasticism.