The Function of Lines

Georges VantongerlooWW-1936-118576

1936·Brush with opaque and transparent watercolor and pen and black ink on beige, wove paper·49.1 × 59.9 cm (19 3/8 × 23 5/8 in.)

<p>The reduction of form to vertical and horizontal lines and the use of only black, white, and primary colors seen in this work characterized the art and design of the early 20th-century avant-garde Dutch De Stijl group. Although primarily a sculptor, Georges Vantongerloo insisted that his two-dimensional works were equally crucial to his practice. At the time that he made The Function of Lines, he was a member of Abstraction-Création, a Paris-based, international association of artists dedicated to the principles of pure abstraction.</p>

Catalogue

Year: 1936
Medium: Brush with opaque and transparent watercolor and pen and black ink on beige, wove paper
Dimensions: 49.1 × 59.9 cm (19 3/8 × 23 5/8 in.)
Collection: Art Institute of Chicago
Artist: Georges Vantongerloo

Artist

Georges Vantongerloo

Printmaking

Georges Vantongerloo was a Belgian sculptor and painter who worked with geometric abstraction and mathematical systems throughout the twentieth century. He explored three-dimensional form through carved wood, stone, and bronze, as well as constructed works in metal and plastic that embodied principles of proportion and spatial harmony. His practice bridged sculpture and painting through a rigorous engagement with linear perspective and architectural space. Vantongerloo's work was central to the development of constructivist and geometric abstraction in Europe between the wars and afterward.

Antwerp, Belgium

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Plate 20 from Futurists, Abstractionists, Dadaists: the Forerunners of the Avant-Garde, vol. I

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