The Spiritual in Art: Abstract Painting 1890-1985 (1986)

Traces the use of geometric signs by the Nabis and other French artists and relates this to the development of abstraction. The author describes some of the sources of ideas about the symbolism of geometric signs, in particular the writings of Helena P. Blavatsky, and traces the impact of these on the Nabis, possibly through the stimulus of Gauguin whose paintings from his Brittany period encouraged a mystical conception of art in which sacred geometry figured as one component. He goes on to discuss in detail the paintings of Paul Serusier, Paul Ranson, Maurice Denis, Charles Filiger, Jean Delville, Frantisek Kupka and Mondrian. Condition: some light wear to extremities of covers, otherwise very good.