A painter born Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan in the Netherlands, he was an important contributor to the De Stijl art movement led by Theo van Doesburg and committed to abstraction and non-objective painting focused on geometric lines and the three primary colors. Ever underlying his work was a constant quest for spiritual truth.

He spent much of his career in Paris and also had a residency in New York City where he died of pneumonia at age 71. He was raised in a family strictly committed to Protestantism. His father taught drawing at a private school and his uncle, Fritz Mondriaan, was a known painter who influenced and encouraged the interests of his nephew. In 1912, he changed the spelling of his n...