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Vote here for the Piet Mondrian Archive! Click on the arrows until the RKD video clip appears, give it a
five-star rating and press ‘STEM’. The RKD needs your vote to become winner of the title Hollandse Nieuwe 2013.

Mondrian’s passion for cooking
Among the personal items preserved in the Piet Mondrian Archive is a small notebook with handwritten comments about food. The comments were written by the French
artist Jean Hélion for his close friend Mondrian, ‘who knows
that one should nurture the body as carefully as the mind’. Both men shared a passion for healthy nutrition. In Mondrian’s case this led him to take up the Hay diet. The principle of this diet, which at the time was followed by various people including the celebrated French photographer Man Ray, is to avoid eating protein and carbohydrate at the same meal.

Mondrian’s preoccupation with cooking and healthy eating also played a role when he was pondering his immigration to the United States. Writing from London to Harry Holtzman in 1939, he explained that he would rather not undertake the journey to New York, despite the constant bombardment:
‘[…] I have all I need for working and cooking here’. Eventually Mondrian changed his mind and did make the crossing to New York in 1940 after all.

Mondrian archive nominated for Avro’s Hollandse
Nieuwe competition
Last year the RKD acquired the private archive of the world-renowned artist Piet Mondrian (1872-1944). This acquisition has now been nominated for the annual ‘Hollandse Nieuwe’
competition organised by the AVRO TV show ‘Kunstuur’. Ten remarkable acquisitions made by Dutch museums have been selected to compete for the title of Hollandse Nieuwe 2013. What do art lovers think of the new acquisitions, and how well do they fit into the respective collections?

Mondrian kept few personal belongings. He burned all letters he received because he felt that their content was private. His personal archive thus constitutes a highly important acquisition for the RKD, which holds the world’s largest collection of archival and documentary material on Mondrian.

The Piet Mondrian Archive offers unique insights
into both the professional and private life of the artist. Part of the archive can be viewed online using the new website www.mondriaan.nl, which has been made in collaboration between the RKD and the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag.

A selection of items from the archive is currently on display at the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag. To watch a video about the presentation, click here: The making of ...

The RKD (Netherlands Institute for Art History) is the world’s leading information centre and central source for the study of Dutch art.