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Composition with Red, Yellow, and Blue
About the Artwork
During the 1910s, Piet Mondrian’s art progressed from Cubism to an increasingly abstract style based on the form of a grid. He completely abandoned the representation of natural appearances, limiting himself to horizontal and vertical rectangles and three primary colors (red, yellow, and blue) along with black and white. Intensely intellectual and deeply philosophical, Mondrian believed that following the devastation of World War I, such abstract compositions could contribute to a more harmonious society by communicating in a universal, visual language.
Inscriptions
signed lower center: P M '27
Provenance
J. J. P. Oud, Wassenaar (1955). (E. V. Thaw).
Exhibition history
Year in Review for 1968. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 29-March 9, 1969). Mondrian Retrospective. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY (organizer) (October 7-December 12, 1971); Kunstmuseum Bern, Bern, Switzerland (January 26-March 26, 1972). Creativity in Art and Science, 1860-1960. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 16-November 8, 1987). L'art aux Pays-Bas au XXeme siecle. Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris (organizer) (March 23-July 18, 1994). Monet to Dalí: Modern Masters from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Beijing World Art Museum (May 26-August 27, 2006); Mori Art Center (September 16-November 26, 2006); Seoul Art Center, South Korea (December 22, 2006-March 28, 2007); Seoul Olympic Museum of Art, South Korea (April 7-May 20, 2007); Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, Canada (June 9-September 16, 2007); The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 21, 2007-January 13, 2008); Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN (February 15-June 1, 2008); Utah Museum of Fine Arts, Salt Lake City, UT (June 22-September 21, 2008); The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI (October 12, 2008-January 18, 2009). Mondrian / De Stijl . Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris cedex O4, France (organizer) (December 1, 2010-March 21, 2011). The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s. Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, New York, NY (April 7-August 20, 2017); The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 30, 2017-January 14, 2018). Mondrian and De Stijl. Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina SofÍa, Madrid, Spain (organizer) (November 10, 2020-March 1, 2021) https://www.museoreinasofia.es/exposiciones/mondrian-stijl.
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Piet Mondrian (Dutch, 1872–1944)
- Date
- 1927
- Medium
- oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- Framed: 62.2 x 62.6 x 10.8 cm (24 1/2 x 24 5/8 x 4 1/4 in.); Unframed: 49.5 x 49.5 cm (19 1/2 x 19 1/2 in.)
- Type
- Painting
- Classification
- Painting
- Department
- Modern European Painting and Sculpture
- Credit line
- Contemporary Collection of The Cleveland Museum of Art
- Accession no.
- 1967.215
More by Piet Mondrian in museum collections
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Open-access museum record · AT-00009207
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