Lot Essay
The museum 'Het Mondriaanhuis' in Amersfoort is currently preparing a special exhibition about the present lot. The future owner will be kindly asked to give the work on loan for this exhibition.
To be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné on the artist's work by Robert Welsh and Joop Joosten
Throughout his whole career, even while he was devoted to pure abstraction Mondriaan continued to paint flowerpieces. As a result, the dating of chrysanthemum still lifes is relatively difficult. This lot dates probably from around 1920-1925. According to A.P. van den Briel the flowers are a category by themselves, a closed privileged group: "Sometimes by fits and starts, he wanted to paint them just like that. This has a much deeper meaning. A memory of something vastly beautiful he had experienced, and something sad. He did remark once or twice that it hurt him to do those flowers. They reflect much of Mondrian's inner life as an individual and as a painter." (letter from A.P. van den Briel to J.M. Harthoorn, Mondrian's creative realism, Mijdrecht 1980, p. 15)
See colour illustration
To be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné on the artist's work by Robert Welsh and Joop Joosten
Throughout his whole career, even while he was devoted to pure abstraction Mondriaan continued to paint flowerpieces. As a result, the dating of chrysanthemum still lifes is relatively difficult. This lot dates probably from around 1920-1925. According to A.P. van den Briel the flowers are a category by themselves, a closed privileged group: "Sometimes by fits and starts, he wanted to paint them just like that. This has a much deeper meaning. A memory of something vastly beautiful he had experienced, and something sad. He did remark once or twice that it hurt him to do those flowers. They reflect much of Mondrian's inner life as an individual and as a painter." (letter from A.P. van den Briel to J.M. Harthoorn, Mondrian's creative realism, Mijdrecht 1980, p. 15)
See colour illustration