Thus, a painting that adhered to neoplastic art theory would typically consist of a balanced composition of simple geometric shapes, right-angled relationships and primary colors.

This word perfectly describes the nature of plastic arts, which involve the use of materials that can be molded or shaped.

[10] Introducing their translation of Mondrian's publications, Holtzman and James wrote: The Dutch verb beelden and substantive beelding signify form-giving, creation, and by extension image – as do gestalten and Gestaltung in German, where Neo-Plastic[ism] is translated as Die neue Gestaltung.

The English plastic and the French plastique stem from the Greek plassein, [meaning] to mold or to form, but do not quite encompass the creative and structural signification of beelding.

[14][d] The book was translated into French with the help of Mondrian's old friend, Dr Rinus Ritsema van Eck.

[22] After moving to the United States, Mondrian wrote several articles in English with the help of Harry Holtzman and Charmion von Wiegand, in which he maintained the use of the term 'plastic'.

In German, the term nieuwe beelding is translated as neue Gestaltung, which is close in its complexity of meanings to the Dutch.

This has been further confounded by the editors of the collected English edition of Mondrian's writings, who adopted the absurd term "the New Plastic".

[26] According to neoplastic principles,[27][28] every work of art (painting, sculpture, building, piece of music, book, etc.,) is created intentionally.

The most realistic painters, such as Johannes Vermeer or Rembrandt van Rijn, use all kinds of artistic means to achieve the greatest possible degree of harmony.

There is therefore a duality in painting and sculpture – and to a lesser extent in architecture, music and literature – between the idea of the artist and the matter of the world around us.

[24][33][34] The neo-plasticists of De Stijl expressed their vision (plastic) in terms of 'pure' elements, not found in nature: straight lines, right angles, primary colours and precise relationships.

[42] In 1920 he arrived at the following definition: The painter, the architect, the sculptor and the furniture maker each realize that they have only one essential visual value: harmony through proportion.

[45] Although countless artists embraced and applied the ideas of neoplasticism during the interwar period, its origins can mainly be attributed to Theo van Doesburg and Piet Mondrian.

[47] When Van Doesburg and Mondrian first made public their ideas about the New Plastic art, both painters were influenced by theosophy.

Van Doesburg distanced himself from theosophy around 1920 and focused on quasi-scientific theories such as the fourth dimension and what he called 'mechanical aesthetics' (design by mechanical means).

Unlike Mondrian, Van Doesburg was better informed of the latest developments in theory and adopted many ideas from other theorists, including Wilhelm Worringer.

Van Doesburg borrowed the idea that art and architecture was composed of separate elements from Wölfflins Kunstgeschichtliche Grundbegriffe from 1915.

The Biedermeier and the Idealism and Reform in the nineteenth century restored the balance somewhat, ending in the time of Neoplasticism (Neue Gestaltung), in which the polarity between the natural and spiritual was completely abolished.

"[53] A number of contributors to De Stijl mention the fourth dimension several times in passing – for example Gino Severini in his article entitled "La Peinture D'Avant-Garde".

[55] Theo van Doesburg had an interest in the fourth dimension (motion) from 1918, [56][57] eventually finding expression in Elementarism, most prominently seen in his architectural interior designs, such as the Aubette in Strasbourg.

If the artist wants to approach the truth as closely as possible, he dissolves the natural form into these most elementary visual means.

[61] Following Schoenmaekers – who associated the physical with the horizontal, and the spiritual with the vertical – the neo-plastic painters applied horizontal and vertical lines with rectangular areas of color in order to radically simplify painting, purifying art of those elements that are not directly related to expressing "pure reality".

[63] He applied a similar principle to architecture, concluding that the sculptor is concerned with 'volume ratio' and the architect with 'ratio of enclosed spaces'.

Many of these ideas come from the German architect Gottfried Semper, for example the great emphasis on walls as a plane and as a divider of space and the principle of 'unity in the multiplicity' (the realisation that buildings, furniture, sculptures and paintings can be seen not only as units, but also as assemblages of separate elements).

It was also Berlage who, after a visit to the United States in 1911, introduced the Netherlands to the work of the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright.

Wright's ideas found favour with the architects of De Stijl, not least because of 'his mystical contrast between the horizontal and vertical, the external and internal, nature and culture'.

[66] The architect J. J. P. Oud talks about the primary means of representation and, like Van Doesburg, sees a strong similarity with modern painting in that respect.

[69] By 1923, the inclusion of volume and time as elements of neoplasticism caused serious rifts between Mondrian and Oud, and later with Van Doesburg, who went on the evolve the philosophy of De Stijl to Elementarism.

In 1923, Van Doesburg wrote that film should not be seen as a two-dimensional art form, but has its own visual means: light, movement and space.