De Stijl

‘Society is changing and so she pleads for a new robe, for her old one is worn through; patching it up will no longer do… that new robe is the new style that must be created…’ - Bart van der Leck.

In 1917, which was the period after World War 1, architects and designers were discovering new methods and ideas relating to design. A group amongst these, that was inspired from the industrial era, was created by Dutch artists whose ideas and designs were published in a publication which was devoted to modern neo-Plasticism, was called De Stijl and eventually formed the De Stijl movement.

According to H.P Berlage every piece of furniture is a little architectural structure. The difference between applied arts, architecture and urban planning, for him, is blurred. He was convinced that social and spiritual progress will engender an art that suits modern life perfectly. That art will have style ‘Stijl’.

Those who relate to this movement asked the question as to what is De Stijl from the very beginning. Three categories of answers were given. Some said that De Stijl was a magazine; others said that it was an art movement. Lastly there were those who said that De Stijl was an idea, a worldview and an approach to life. According to Van Doesburg’s presentation, De Stijl began as an idea, out of the idea a movement formed; the movement expressed itself in the form of a journal.

The story of how De Stijl came to be, is about the production of an artistic and cultural phenomenon out of basic human interactions. Very often, rather than collaboration, disagreement seems to be the dominant theme. De Stijl is associated with instantly recognized objects such as the radical and abstract painting of Piet Mondrian, who was a great influence on the movement. Even some of the early work belonging to Frank Lloyd Wright was influential on their notions about form.

Their philosophy was all about functionalism, and the concept behind this style was to create art that diminishes formality with the use of strictly primary colours and non-colours (black and white), together with the use of straight lines. The intention behind this concept was to express new artistic ideals or both order and harmony by reducing images to the absolute essentials.

'Self-portrait' by Theo Van Doesberg

De Stijl was a reflection of the emerging trend of the 20^th century that was; the joining of art and design worlds that were separated during Renaissance. The leader of this movement was Theo van Doesburg who was a Dutch painter and designer, whose early work is compared to Vincent Van Gogh’s.

'Counter composition'- Theo van Doesburg

It was his devotion to pure, abstract art that led him to found De Stijl. Piet Mondrian, Vilmos Huszar and Gerrit Rietveld followed his footsteps that eventually influenced following movements in art and design.

Theo Van Doesburg, together with Cor van Eesteren, exploded the conventional box like structure of a building, which is viewed as interpreting spaces unfolding in time. Theo van Doesburg, was also enchanted by Kandinsky’s abstract art, and he was more influenced when he met Mondrian and establishes De Stijl as an instrument of propaganda. By 1924, De Stijl dominated art everywhere.

Art reproduction Oil Painting- 'Black and Violet'- Kandinsky

'Line over form'- Piet Mondrian

Piet Mondrain, embarked on a quest of a truly abstract form of painting. This kind of painting did not simply combine lines and colours in a decorative way, but it made tangible the ‘spirit of the coming age’. Through experimentation he came to the conclusion that pure, intense, inner colours and the strong, simple, manifestation of the line could help release such an abstract form of art. His work is demonstrated in several of De Stijl designs.

One of those who were inspired by Mondrian’s work was Vilmos Huszár, who is one of the most loyal artists of De Stijl. When, in 1916, he saw Mondrian’s work, he became devoted to it, and he began mixing painting, design and the surrounding environment.

‘What is a hammer to an artist? Its function: hammering. What is a saw to an artist? Its function: sawing. The painter has observed hammering as a vertical movement, sawing as horizontal. These two simultaneous movements are the visual movements on which he builds the entire composition… the rectangular visual space is full of movement, the sum of the vertical hammer movements and the countervailing saw movements…’

'Composition (Hammer and Saw)'

Furthermore, Gerrit Rietveld made a major contribution to this movement. This occurred when he took the armchair and reconfigured it as a series of self- supporting planks known as the Red/Blue chair that was done in 1918. Its design encapsulates the philosophy of the De Stijl movement. This chair not only affected not only furniture design, but the history of architecture itself. Rietveld's "Red and Blue" chair is now in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art.

Paul Overy in his book called ‘De Stijl’ said; ‘One of the functions of Rietveld's chairs, with their hard seats and backs, is to focus our senses, to make us alert and aware. Rietveld was not interested in conventional ideas of comfort (the 19th century armchair that relaxes you so much that you spill your coffee or fall asleep over your book). He wished to keep the sitter physically and mentally "toned up."

"I am constantly concerned," Rietveld said, "with this extraordinary idea of the awakening of the consciousness." That is why he came to design the most influential chair of the 20th century--and even he was surprised at the big effect his Red and Blue chair had.

The stability that the black verticals and horizontals give a bright motion with the use of the bright yellow squares and rectangles, which at the same time makes the audience more aware of the chair’s structure. Furthermore, the glossiness of the black finishes adds liveliness to the chair and a sense of complexity. Mondrian and the artists of the De Stijl movement worked on the principle that all art has to have "dynamic equilibrium." 

This piece was exhibited in the Bauhaus in 1923 and was influential upon Marcel Breuer who designed later a tubular metal B3 Wassily chair in 1925-27.

Rietveld’s chair is the result of the practical work of art. Its sculptural form was assembled by the concepts behind this style; verticals, horizontals and primary colours.

The Zigzag chair designed in 1932-34 was influential upon other chairs such as the Panton chair whose form is round and made of plastic.

'Panton Chair'

'Zigzag chair'

In addition, Gerrit Rietveld’s Schroeder House is the most complete realization of the De Stijl’s beauty. It was commissioned by Mrs Truus Schröder-Schräder and the building is now a museum. The house has a fundamental attitude to design and together with the use of space, it is an icon of the Modern Movement in architecture. The Schröder House was built on the edge of the city of Utrecht, at the end of a 19th-century row of houses. There is a few drawing of the house and a scale model that illustrate that the design behind it grew from a fairly close block to an open transparent composition of uniformly coordinated spaces made out of independent planes.

The house has two floors, and these develop about a spiral staircase in the centre. The main structure comprises of concrete blocks and steel contours. Furthermore, the house is painted in basic colours and shades of grey that are a reflection to Mondrian's paintings.

Not only the building structure itself, but also its furnishings and decoration were designed by Reitveld. The cube was the underlying form for the architecture of the house. Together with openness, lightness and pillars the use of new material was also incorporated. Differing from a traditional Dutch house, Rietveld’s house is composed of rooms in a flexible way. Rooms are not arranged in a hierarchical manner. Rietveld transformed a big room to a smaller one with the use of partitions. The upper floor is one open space and it can be divided into three bedrooms and a sitting room with the use of sliding panels. However, for Rietveld to be able to obtain a building permit, on the ground floor he was forced to meet the Dutch regulations.

The strong lines that where incorporated in the interior produced dynamism, and these were combined with a sense of lightness that was created through the removal of ornaments. The removal of unnecessary materials approach, was very influential upon the development of the Modern Movement as well as the use of geometric formalism.

In each case, every person involved had a common goal in the discovery of the basic principles of their respective practices and a common aspiration that they might combine together to forge a new style appropriate for the modern age. From the 1930s onwards, De Stijl was recognized internationally as the most important contribution to modern culture made by the Netherlands.

Bibliography: 

Hans Janssen and Michael White, 2011. The Story of De Stijl Mondrian to Van Doesburg. 

Art, Design and Visual thinking, 1995. De Stijl. [Online] Available at:  http://char.txa.cornell.edu/art/decart/destijl/decstijl.htm [Accessed at 10th November 2013]

Styleture. What is De Stijl?. [Online] Available at:  http://www.styleture.com/2011/06/14/de-stijl/ [Accessed at 9th November 2013]

Anthony C. Romeo. Home; Aesthetic Realism Foundation. Gerrit Rietveld's Red and Blue Chair. [blog]. Available at:  http://www.terraingallery.org/Anthony-Romeo-Chair.html [Accessed at 9th November 2013]

UNESCO, 1992. Rietveld Schröderhuis. [Online] Available at: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/965 [Accessed at 10th November 2013]