De Stijl.

De Stijl means the style. De Stijl was one of the created modernist styles, which was created as a reaction to World War I and was a rejection to pre-war styles which was mainly decorative. This was an artistic group and it was founded in 1917 in Leiden, this group was formed mainly by Dutch artists. These artists published a journal to reveal their ideas. Theo van Doesburg was one  of the pioneers who formed this style. This Journal was founded by Van Doesburg and Mondrian and it continued to edit until 1928 by van Doesburg.

Theo van Doesburg

Theo Van Doesburg included his elements to typography. Doesburg built his letters on horizontal and vertical lines which would replace the curves and diagonal lines, hence the De Stijl philosophy of reducing form. Sans-serif is widely seen in this style.

Piet Mondrian

De Stijl main priciples was of aiming for laws of equilibrium and harmony (like Greeks) that would be applicable to life and society as well as art, their style is described as abstract clarity. The use of the grid in their work make this style geometric and more balanced.

Mondrian said,” I found that the right angle is the only constant relationship, and that, through the proportions of dimension, its constant expression can be given movement, that is, made living.” (Flanagan,1962, p.246)

Mondrian was one of the most important artists of this style.He is recognized for the purity of his abstractions and methodical practice by which he arrived at them. He radically simplified the elements of his paintings to reflect what he saw as the spiritual order underlying the visible world, creating a clear, universal aesthetic language within his works. In his 1920s best known paintings , he reduced his shapes to lines and rectangles and his palette to fundamental basics pushing past references to the outside world toward pure abstraction. His use of asymmetrical balance and a simplified forms were crucial in the development of modern art, and his iconic abstract works remain influential in design and familiar in popular culture to this day.

Piet Mondrian work of art

He said, "I wish to approach truth as closely as is possible, and therefore I abstract everything until I arrive at the fundamental quality of objects." (MOMA)
Mondrian ceased to contibute to De Stijl after 1924 and in 1926 van Doesburg published the manifesto of another branch from De Stijl and he called it Elemntarism. Despite this lack of cohersion, this style was probably the most influential of the many avant-garde publications in Europe between the two wars. De Stijl had influenced everything, it influenced ; graphics, art, architecture, sculptue, typography and furniture. Examples of artists that were influence from this style were Geral Rietvert who was an architect and designer and Georges Vantongerloo was was a sculptor.

This style was the dawn of flat graphic design, this effected a lot of other flat design syles like the new typographic style. Flat designs are still used till this day.

Bibliography

Chilvers.I, 2009,Dictionary of art and artists,4th edition, New York:Oxford university Press.

Design Is History, De Stijl. [Web] Available at: <http://www.designishistory.com/1920/de-stijl/> [Accessed 28 January 2015]

Flanagan, G.A.,1962, Understand and Enjoy Moder Art,New York: Thomas Y.Crowell Company

THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART,Piet Mondrian , 2015. [Web] Available at: <http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=33419 > [Accessed 27 January 2015]