Composition IV (Still life) 1916

Theo van Doesburg made this ‘Composition IV (Still Life)’ painting with oil on canvas. It’s like he's wrestling with the old idea of a still life, taking it apart and rebuilding it with shapes. Look at the way he’s layered the paint; it’s smooth, almost like he’s trying to hide the brushstrokes. But then you see these geometric forms, these circles and squares, and you realize it’s not about hiding anything, it’s about the act of building, of composing. See that cluster of circles near the bottom? It’s almost like a bunch of grapes, but they’re also just shapes bumping up against each other, creating this little dance of darks and lights. Van Doesburg was part of this whole De Stijl movement, along with Piet Mondrian, exploring how far you can push abstraction. You can see the influence, but where Mondrian is all straight lines, Van Doesburg is playing with diagonals, pushing the composition off balance.