In the manner of Piet Mondrian
Dutch, 1872–1944
Traffic Boogie Woogie, 2026
Oil on canvas
127 × 127 cm
Never painted.
Commissioned for the collection, 2026.
PAB 2026.17.5
Two thick lines cross in the middle of the canvas, and neither is black: they are made of stuttering red and yellow blocks, like cars bunched at a light. Where they meet, small blue squares gather. In New York, Mondrian swapped his black lines for lines of colour, because the city had set everything in motion. At this crossing it has stopped moving again.
The brief
Two thick black lines crossing at the centre, made of stuttering red and yellow blocks, small blue squares clustered at the crossing. De Stijl neoplastic oil painting, a grid of black horizontal and vertical lines of varying thickness on white, rectangles filled with pure red, yellow and blue, some lines broken into small stuttering blocks of colour like lights along a route, strict flatness, hand-painted edges slightly imperfect, matte surface. Museum photograph of the oil painting, flat even lighting, no frame, no text, no wall, no floor, cropped to the canvas edge.
Written to the house rules. The painter's name does not appear.
Take it home
The painting on this room's wall, at its own proportions, nothing written on it.
