Generative Art Timeline · Chapter 2: Modern Era (1850–1949)

1930

Concrete Art Coined by Theo van Doesburg

Event

Worn cream Art Concret cover with enormous blue letters A and C and a black line of introductory text.
Theo van Doesburg, cover of Art Concret, 1930. Theo van Doesburg. Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed, Instituut Collectie Nederland, AB5033. Reproduced by the Getty Research Institute. Image source.

One of the foundational movements in the history generative art, the Dutch artist and architect’s term describes abstract art based on mathematic or scientific principles with an emphasis on planes and color. Concrete art to van Doesburg was not abstraction based on reality but was reality itself with a focus on the immediate materiality of art.

Text by Peter Bauman. Generative Art Timeline, Le Random, fact-checked September 2026.

Sources

People

Theo van Doesburg

Movements

concrete art

Filed under

Ideas
abstraction, color, concrete art, generative art history, materiality, mathematics, science
People
Theo van Doesburg
Places
Netherlands

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