Kazimir Malevich and Piet Mondrian

Paper Summary:

This paper explains non-objective art and then compares and contrasts how Kazimir Malevich and Piet Mondrian expressed their perceptions of the intimate connection between the spiritual and the non-objective through their writings and their paintings. The author concludes that Malevich tended to link non-objective artwork explicitly with western, organized religion; while Mondrian favored a more diffuse type of spiritualism reminiscent of eastern religions.

Outline
Introduction
Part I: Malevich's "take" on the Relationship between the Spiritual and the Non-Objective
Part II: Mondrian's "take" on the Relationship between the Spiritual and the Non-Objective

From the Paper:

"Ultimately, what Malevich was really after - certainly in his "Suprematist" work - was to strive after something more ethereal and to leave the "earth" behind. Suffice it to say, this striving after the metaphysical, along with the perception that non-objective art could uncover a new kind of logic, hearkens back to spirituality in the sense that religion also demands that people disassociate themselves from the flesh, live for the world beyond this one, and put their trust not in humanism or in common logic but in a faith or "beyond reason-ness" that relies on intuition more so than anything else."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Douglas, Charlotte. "Malevich, Bergson, and the Italian Futurists:1914-1915." In Swans of Other Worlds: Kazimir, Malevich and the Origins of Abstraction in Russia. 49-62. Additional publication information not provided, 1976.
• Malevich, Kazimir. "From Cubism to Suprematism in Art, to the New Realism of Painting, to Absolute Creation." In Swans of Other Worlds: Kazimir Malevich and the Origins of Abstraction in Russia. 107-110. Ed. Charlotte Douglas. Additional information not provided, 1976.
• Malevich, Kazimir. "God is not cast down." Essays on Art, Vol.I. 196-99. Additional information not provided.
• Henderson, Linda Dalrymple. "Mysticism, Romanticism, and the Fourth Dimension." Additional bibliographic information (including date of publication) not provided, 219-238.
• Holtzman, Harry and Martin S. James. "Piet Mondrian: Art and Theory to 1917." The New Art - The New Life: The Collected Writings of Piet Mondrian. 13-14. Boston: G.K. Hall & Company, 2002.

More papers on Kazimir Malevich and Piet Mondrian:

• Analytical Essay # 134730 : "Utopian Geometry: Kasimir Malevich and Piet Mondrian"
• Essay # 26119 : "Piet Mondrian and his Artistic Works"
• Essay # 41971 : "Piet Mondrian"

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