Piet Mondrian vs. William James
Side-by-side comparison of two thinkers
Piet Mondrian
1872 – 1944
Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan, known after 1911 as Piet Mondrian, was a Dutch painter and art theoretician, who is regarded as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. He was one of the pioneers of 20th-century abstract art, as he changed his artistic direction from figurative painting to an increasingly abstract style, until he reached a point where his artistic vocabulary was taken down to simple geometric elements.
"It is clear to me that this is art for the future. Futurism, although it has advanced beyond naturalism, occupies itself too much with human sensations. Cubism …"
William James
1842 – 1910
William James was an American philosopher and psychologist. The first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States, he is considered to be one of the leading thinkers of the late 19th century, one of the most influential philosophers and is often dubbed the "father of American psychology". A Review of General Psychology analysis, published in 2002, ranked James as the 14th most eminent psychologist of the 20th century.
"The difference between the first- and second-best things in art absolutely seems to escape verbal definition — it is a matter of a hair, a shade, an inward quiv…"
Connections
Both wrote about: