6.14.2014

Piet Mondrian And Francis Bacon Paintings

By Darren Hartley


Marking the transition from the Hague school and Symbolism to Neo-Impressionism and Cubism at the start of the 20th century are the Piet Mondrian paintings. Composed of the most fundamental aspects of line and color, they represented the universal and dynamic pulse of life.

A unique personal style was involved in the creation of Piet Mondrian paintings. Termed neo-plasticism by Piet himself, they are not based on outside artistic influences or typical techniques. Instead, they are interpretations of deeply felt philosophical beliefs of theosophy and anthroposophy. The former is a religious mysticism which sought to help humanity achieve perfection while the latter held that the spiritual world was directly accessible through the development of the inner self.

Piet Mondrian paintings gradually began to simplify and abstract the colors and shapes of their subject matter, as Piet explored nature his own way. This process of simplification and reduction eventually became evident even in his paintings not related to nature in any way.

Francis Bacon paintings were known for their raw graphic style and distorted images of people. Francis Bacon, one of the most famous 20th century British painters, was described as that man who paints those dreadful paintings.

An assemblage of meat carcasses and a mutilated, almost headless man beneath an umbrella is included among the Francis Bacon paintings. Francis started painting on the unprimed side of the canvas, said to be the wrong side, by 1948. The technique proved to be totally attuned to his temperature. Francis decided to stick to the technique from then on till the end of his life.

Created in 1949, Head VI was one of the Francis Bacon paintings that stood apart in exhibitions, with its sensuous purple cape. It was a variation on Velazquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X, a theme exploited by Francis with obsessive intensity throughout the following decade. This dependency was manifested though the use of reproductions, which had the positive effect of encouraging Francis to take an extravagant license to his art.




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