114 THEO VAN DOESBURG
From Towards Plastic Architecture (1924)
The years 1921—2 were crucial to the development of De Still theory. In 1921, after his break-up
with Oud, Van Doesburg took his (nearly) one-man show on the road and met El Lissitzky and
others in Berlin. Out of these meetings came his artistic alliance with Soviet Constructivism and
German Dadaist circles. The Dutch artist shortly thereafter relocated his journal and studio to
Weimar — again in search of disciples — where he gave a series of lectures opposing the
Bauhaus’s original curriculum of crafts-based studies. While in Weimar, van Doesburg met the
Dutch architect Cornelius van Eesteren, who was touring Germany in 1922. The result was a new
collaboration, in which the two men began a series of axonometric drawings of three-dimensional
planes suspended in space. In Paris in the following year, they collaborated again on the design of
three houses for a De Still exhibition in Paris. The models for these projects were made by Garrit
Rietveld, who had been active in De Stiji circles since 1917. The gallery drawings, in turn, became
the basis for Rietveld’s famous design for the Schröder House. All of this activity led a
reformulation of De Still thought in 1923—4, as seen in this statement penned by van Doesburg.
This melding of De Still and constructivist theory marks the first great synthesis of postwar
European theory. Van Doesburg’s characterization of the new architecture as “anti-cubic,” for
instance, would offer a formal alternative to the frontally-conceived villas of te Corbusier, while
his emphasis on “space-time” introduces a concept into modern theory that also would be later
seized by others.
1 Form. The basis for a healthy development of architecture (and of art in general) is the
suppression of all form-ideas insofar as this concept implies a predetermined type.
Instead of using earlier style types as models and thus imitating previous historical styles, one
necessarily must pose the problem of architecture entirely anew.
2 The new architecture is elementary, which signifies that it develops from the elements of
construction as understood in the most comprehensive sense. These elements are for example,
function, mass, plane, time, space, light, colour and material, and they are, moreover, also plastic
elements.
3 The new architecture is economical, which signifies that the elementary means are organized
either as efficiently and economically as possible or by wasting neither these means nor the
material.
4 The new architecture is functional, which signifies that it develops from the precise
determination of practical necessities which it embodies in a clear groundplan.
5 The new architecture is formless, yet defined, which signifies that it is not characterized by any
predetermined aesthetic form-type or mould (like those used by pastry-cooks) into which it casts
the functional spaces derived from practical living demands.
In contrast to all earlier historical styles, the new architectural method imposes no standard or
basic type.
The division of functional spaces is strictly determined by rectangular planes which possess
themselves no individual shapes, since, although defined (one plane by the other), they can be
extended infinitely by the imagination. Thus they can create a coordinated system in which all
points correspond to an equal number of points in universal, unlimited open space.
It follows that the planes possess a direct relationship with open (exterior) space.
6 The new architecture has rendered the concept of the monumental independent of largeness and
smallness (since the word ‘monumental’ has been abused, it is replaced by the word ‘plastic’).
This architecture has demonstrated that everything exists in terms of relationships, through the
principle of interrelationship.
7 The new architecture possesses no passive moment. It has abandoned the use of ‘dead spaces’
(holes in the wall). The openness of the window has an active meaning as against the closure of
the wall.surface. Nowhere does a hole or a void issue forth, everything is strictly determined by
means of contrast. See the various counter-constructions, in which the elements of architecture,
such as, plane, line and mass, have been freely arranged into a three-dimensional relationship. [. . .
8 The groundplan. The new architecture has opened the walls, thus eliminating the separateness
of the interior and the exterior.
The whole wall no longer carries, it is reduced to points of support. The result is a new, open
groundplan, which is completely different from the traditional usage, since interior and exterior
space interpenetrate.
9 The new architecture is open. The whole consists of one space, which is divided according to the
various functional demands. This division is accomplished through the use of separating planes
(in the interior) or by projecting planes (on the exterior).
The former planes, which separate the different functional spaces, can be mobile, which means
that the separating planes (formerly the interior walls) can be replaced by movable screens or slabs
(doors can also be treated in this manner). In the following phase of this development in
architecture, the groundplan must disappear completely. The principle of two-dimensionally
projected space-composition, asfixed by a groundplan, will be replaced by exact calculation of the
construction, a calculation which must transfer the carrying capacity to the simplest but sturdiest
points of support. Eudidean mathematics will no longer serve this purpose; yet by using NonEucidean calculations in four dimensions, this calculation can be accomplished quite easily.
10 Space and time. The new architecture calculates not only with space but also with time as an
architectural value. The unity of space and time will give architectural form a new and completely
plastic aspect, that is, a four-dimensional, plastic space—time aspect.
11 The new architecture is anti-cubic, which specifies that it does not attempt to combine all
functional space-cells into one closed cube, but projects the functional space-cells (as well as
overhanging planes, the volumes of balconies and so forth) centrifugally, or from the core of the
cube outward, thereby giving a completely new plastic expression in open space to the dimensions
of height, width, depth + time.
In this manner architecture takes on a more or less hovering aspect (insofar as this is feasible from
a structural point of view, which is a problem for the engineer!). This aspect, so to speak,
challenges the force of gravity in nature.
12 Symmetry and repetition. The new architecture has suppressed symmetry’s monotonous
repetition as well as the rigid equality which results from division into two halves or the use of the
mirror image.
It employs neither repetition in time, street walls, nor standardized parts. A block of houses is as
much a whole as a single house. The laws governing single houses apply also to both blocks of
houses and the city as a whole. In place of symmetry, the new architecture proposes a balanced
relationship of unequal parts; that is to say of parts which, because of functional characteristics,
differ in position, size, proportion and situation.
The equivalence of these parts is gained through an equilibrium of unequality rather than of
equality. In addition, the new architecture has granted equal value to the ‘front’, ‘back’, ‘right’,
and possibly also to the ‘above’ and ‘below’.
13 In contrast to frontalism, which was born out of a rigid, static concept of life, the new
architecture offers the plastic richness of an all-sided development in space—time.
14 Colour. The new architecture has suppressed painting as a separate, illusory expression of
harmony, whether as embodied indirectly in representational art or directly in an art of coloured
planes.
The new architecture employs colour organically as a direct means of expression of relationships
in space and time. Without colour, these relationships are devoid of the aspect of living reality;
they are invisible. The equilibrium of the architectural relationships becomes a visible reality only
through the use of colour. The task of the modern painter is to integrate colour into a harmonic
whole (by placing it not on a plane-surface of two dimensions, but within the new realm of fourdimensional space—time). In a succeeding phase of development, colour might also be replaced
by synthetic materials which possess their own specific colours (this is a problem for the chemical
scientist), but only if practical demands require such materials.
15 The new architecture is anti-decorative. Colour — and colour-shy people must strive to realize
this — is not a decorative or ornamental part of architecture but its organic means of expression.
16 Architecture as the synthesis of Neo-Plasticism. Construction is only one part of the new
architecture; by including all the arts, in their most elementary appearance, the new architecture
manifests its very essence.
This architecture presupposes a capacity for thinking in four dimensions, so that the plastic
architect, who might also be a painter, must construct in the new realm of space—time.
Since the new architecture prohibits representation (such as easel-painting or sculpture as separate
elements), its purpose of creating a harmonic whole from all the above mentioned essential means
is inherent in its very nature. In this manner every architectural element contributes to the
maximum vitality of plastic expression, accomplished on a practical and logical basis, without
prejudice to utilitarian demands.
Paris 1924
Theo van Doesburg, from “Towards Plastic Architecture’ De Still 12:6-7 (1924), trans. Joost Baljeu, in Theo
van Doesburg. New York: Macmillan, 1974, pp. 142, 144-5, 147.