Sunday 21 August 2011

Identifying Mondrian abstracts

I have been working on a straightforward method of identifying Mondrians from the 1920 lines-and-planes abstracts onwards. 


My solution is to count the number of coloured and black planes which gives a 4-digit code. I have listed all the Mondrians by this code and it is then just a question of matching the image in question. The colours are in the sequence red-yellow-blue, then black and so taking the example of B114, Composition with Yellow, Red, Black, Blue and Grey, 1920 on the left, this codes as 1212 and B239 Composition with Red and Blue, 1933 (right) as 2010.
The lookup page is here.


Note that some of the works no longer exist and have been reconstructed, and for some others, I do not have access to a colour image and those have been facsimilated.