A New Start in Paris

In early 1912, Mondrian left the Netherlands for Paris, the heart of the international art world. He was in an upbeat mood, writing that ‘You can be so wonderfully yourself in such a large, cosmopolitan city.’ He stayed for a few months with his friend Conrad Kickert before finding a studio of his own at 26 Rue du Départ, in Montparnasse. He was to change address several times within that neighbourhood, which was home to many artists.

As soon as he arrived in Paris, he started signing his work Mondrian, with one ‘a’. It was easier for non-Dutch colleagues to pronounce and underscored the break with the Netherlands. He worked hard and met many avant-garde artists, thinkers and writers. Pablo Picasso’s Cubism was in its heyday and Mondrian produced several Cubist-looking paintings, like Portrait of a Lady (1912) and Paysage (Landscape) (1912). He also found inspiration in the gaping façades of partially demolished buildings in the streets of Paris. Patches of wallpaper, flaking posters, chimney flues and plasterwork produced abstract patterns of square and rectangular colour planes. The sight inspired works like Composition No.VI (1914) and Composition in Oval with Colour Planes 2 (1914).

When the First World War broke out in 1914, Mondrian happened to be at home, visiting his father. He decided to sit out the war in the Netherlands, but returned to Paris in 1919. In the meantime, he had worked with a group of progressive artists to establish the De Stijl movement. This encouraged him to move to a form of full abstraction relying solely on geometrical lines and primary colours. He took this new advance back with him to Paris. There, he hung his latest, completely abstract paintings on the whitewashed walls of his studio and complemented them by pinning up pieces of coloured cardboard. This allowed him to explore the relationships between colour and form on a large scale and in three dimensions. Visitors described the place as an earthly paradise and his extraordinary studio attracted public attention both in France and internationally.

Mondrian loved the Parisian lifestyle. He was an enthusiastic partygoer and so keen on gallery openings that his friends nicknamed him ‘Piet-zie-je-me-niet’ (“Piet-can’t-you-see-me”). He also adored dancing, whether with local girls in the streets on quatorze juillet or in the most fashionable jazz clubs. Before venturing onto the dance floor, he would practice the steps of new dances like the Charleston, the Foxtrot and the Shimmy privately in his studio. He was also a frequent visitor to Le Dôme and La Rotonde, two well-known artists’ cafés on the Boulevard du Montparnasse.