Trees to Grids

Piet Mondrian began as a landscape painter in the Netherlands, obsessed with painting trees. But between 1908 and 1913, his trees grew steadily more abstract — branches simplified into horizontal and vertical lines until the tree vanished entirely. What remained was a grid. He had extracted the skeleton of nature and thrown away the flesh.

By the 1920s, he had reduced his palette to black, white, gray, and the three primaries — red, yellow, and blue. He believed these were the only elements painting needed. Everything else was decoration, and decoration was dishonest.